Mental Health in the Workplace

Why organisations work with Madison Butler She works inside the people function as a practitioner, not as an outside commentator. Her perspective comes from running employee experience as Chief Experience Officer at GRAV and as a fractional people ops consultant. She has built a structural intervention into her own industry. The Black Speakers Collection was created to close the speaker pay gap for Black speakers, and is now a working directory used by meeting planners. Her book “Let Them See You” (Wiley, 2025) gives buyers a published thesis on authenticity at work that they can hand to a leadership team before the keynote. She speaks credibly on mental health, trauma and psychological safety in workplace settings without softening the operational implications for managers. Named a LinkedIn Top Black Voice and a DivInc Austin Rising Star, with sustained media presence in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Business Insider and Rolling Stone. Biography highlights Author, “Let Them See You: Empowering Change Through Authenticity” (Wiley, 2025) Founder, Black Speakers Collection, a directory created to address pay equity for Black speakers Founder, Blue Haired Unicorn, an HR and DEI consultancy advising on psychological safety and culture design Chief Experience Officer at GRAV, based in Austin, Texas Named a LinkedIn Top Black Voice; named DivInc Austin Rising Star, 2021 Featured in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Business Insider, Yahoo and Rolling Stone Biography The employee experience is the part of the company most leaders do not own. HR runs onboarding, operations runs the systems, leadership sets the tone, and the actual lived experience falls between them. Butler works in that gap. As Chief Experience Officer at GRAV and through her consultancy Blue Haired Unicorn, she designs how a workforce actually moves through the organisation, from joining to leaving. Her published thesis sits in “Let Them See You: Empowering Change Through Authenticity”, released by Wiley in 2025. The argument is that performative culture work fails because it asks people to keep their full selves out of the building. Butler treats authenticity as an operating condition for trust, engagement and retention, not as a value statement. The Black Speakers Collection is her clearest demonstration of how she thinks. Faced with persistent pay inequity for Black speakers in the bureau industry, she built a directory rather than writing a position piece. It is now used by meeting planners as a working resource, profiled by PCMA and Prevue Meetings. Her media presence reflects the breadth of her audience. The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Business Insider, Yahoo and Rolling Stone have carried her commentary on workplace culture, mental health and inclusion. LinkedIn named her a Top Black Voice; DivInc named her Austin Rising Star in 2021. Key speaking topics Psychological safety and workplace culture Authenticity and human-centred leadership Employee experience design Inclusion as operating practice Mental health and trauma at work Future of work and the people function Personal branding and self-presentation at work Ideal for CHROs and chief people officers designing employee experience end to end Heads of DEI and inclusion leads looking for operating substance over signalling Founders and CEOs of scaling companies under cultural strain Internal leadership programmes for managers responsible for psychological safety Audience outcomes A clearer view of where the employee experience is breaking inside their own organisation A sharper distinction between performative culture work and operating culture work Language for managers to discuss mental health, trauma and authenticity at work without flinching Practical reference points from a practitioner running these problems day to day A published thesis (“Let Them See You”) to extend the conversation after the room

Why organisations work with Dona Sarkar She runs the program that lets enterprise developers extend Microsoft Copilot onto their own data, so the practical content of her sessions is what she ships day-to-day at Microsoft, not commentary about it. She brings a track record of building global technical communities at scale, including the Windows Insider Program of around 20 million members, which informs how she advises leaders on adoption inside large workforces. Her work on accessibility and inclusive AI gives organisations a substantive position on responsible AI that goes beyond policy statements into product design and developer practice. She codifies her experience into named frameworks her audiences can use, including the SHENANIGANS approach to solving business problems and a structured method for tackling non-promotable work. She speaks credibly to the human side of AI transformation, from imposter syndrome in technical careers to mental health conversations at work, drawing on her own published books rather than borrowed material. Biography highlights Chief Troublemaker, Microsoft AI and Copilot Extensibility Program. Former Director of Technology for Microsoft Accessibility, leading inclusive design across the company. Led the Windows Insider Program from 2016 to 2019, a global community of around 20 million members. Author of The Imposter Syndrome Banishing Spell, Model 47: A Startup Storybook and You Had Me at Hello World, alongside three young-adult novels published by Harper Collins. Featured in Fast Company’s 100 Most Productive People; profiled in Fast Company and Microsoft’s own publications. Founder of Prima Dona, an ethical fashion line based in Seattle, alongside her engineering career. Biography Microsoft built Copilot, then had to answer the harder question: how do enterprises actually deploy generative AI on their own data, inside their own workflows, without losing the accessibility, governance and developer discipline that make software trustworthy. That is the program Dona Sarkar runs as Chief Troublemaker for Microsoft’s AI and Copilot Extensibility Program, working directly with the developers and IT leaders responsible for moving AI from pilot to production. Before this remit she was Director of Technology for Microsoft Accessibility, a role that shaped her view that inclusive design is engineering, not policy. She led the Windows Insider Program from 2016 to 2019, growing it into a global community of around 20 million members who tested early Windows builds, and she has run developer advocacy across HoloLens and Power Platform. Each of those roles required her to translate engineering decisions for non-technical leaders and to turn vague ambitions into concrete adoption. Outside Microsoft she has published books on imposter syndrome, startup methodology and mentorship, alongside three young-adult novels with Harper Collins. She founded Prima Dona, an ethical fashion line in Seattle, and has coached founders in emerging markets in East and West Africa. Fast Company has named her one of its 100 Most Productive People and profiled her approach to managing complex parallel careers. For senior buyers, her value is operational credibility on the enterprise AI question boards keep asking. She is not describing a market she observes. She runs the platform inside it. Key speaking topics Enterprise generative AI and Copilot deployment Inclusive AI and accessibility in product design Developer community and adoption at scale The future of work alongside AI agents Innovation frameworks for large organisations Career advancement and non-promotable work Mental health and imposter syndrome in technical careers Ideal for CIOs, CTOs and chief data officers planning enterprise AI deployment CHROs and heads of talent designing workforces around AI capability Heads of accessibility, DEI and responsible AI Engineering and developer relations leaders building internal AI fluency Audience outcomes A clearer view of where Copilot and generative AI add operating value on proprietary data, and where they do not A working vocabulary for inclusive AI that connects accessibility decisions to product and engineering practice Named frameworks for innovation and career progression that audiences can apply inside their teams A more honest conversation about imposter syndrome, mental health and burnout in technical organisations A read on Microsoft’s direction of travel on Copilot extensibility from someone responsible for delivering it

Why organisations work with Britteny Floyd-Mayo She built a recognised consumer wellness brand, Trap Yoga Bae®, that reaches audiences who feel ostracised by standard wellness content. That gives her credibility with employees who tune out the corporate version. Her work sits at the intersection of wellbeing and inclusion, two budgets that increasingly need to be defended together. She speaks to both without separating them. She delivers in formats most wellness speakers cannot: a 45-minute movement and music-led experience as comfortably as a keynote or workshop. That makes her useful for offsites, conferences, and ERG events where a talk alone would not move the room. She has been programmed alongside mainstream consumer brands (Lululemon, Eventbrite, Essence Festival), which signals she can hold a corporate stage without softening the cultural specificity that makes the work distinctive. Biography highlights Founder of Trap Yoga Bae®, a trademarked inclusive wellness brand combining yoga, hip-hop culture, and self-care. Studied Positive Psychology and Social Behavioral Studies at Dillard University and Holy Names University. Certified in Vinyasa yoga in India. Named in Forbes among the top 8 Black Wellness experts to watch. Featured in Issa Rae’s HBO Max series Sweet Life. Speaker and featured artist for Lululemon, Eventbrite, Brit + Co, Black Girls Code, Black Joy Parade, and the 25th Annual Essence Festival. Biography Most corporate wellness and inclusion programming is built for a default employee. The people it most needs to reach, those who already feel like outsiders in the room, are the ones who quietly opt out. Britteny Floyd-Mayo built her brand inside that gap. Trap Yoga Bae® started as a response to feeling unwelcome in standard yoga studios. It grew into a trademarked wellness movement that pairs yoga and meditation with hip-hop, cultural specificity, and direct language. The work is taken seriously enough that Forbes has named her among the top Black wellness experts to watch, and that Issa Rae cast her in the HBO Max series Sweet Life. The educational backbone is real. She studied Positive Psychology and Social Behavioral Studies at Dillard University and Holy Names University, and trained for Vinyasa certification in India. That foundation is why the talks travel beyond the yoga mat into burnout, boundary-setting, and the working conditions that shape mental health for women and employees of colour. For organisations, the practical question she answers is uncomfortable but useful. Why are the people your wellbeing and inclusion programmes were designed for the ones most likely to disengage from them, and what does a version look like that they would actually choose? She has built a partnership list (Lululemon, Eventbrite, Black Girls Code, Essence Festival) that suggests the answer travels. Key speaking topics Inclusive wellbeing and self-care Burnout prevention for women founders and leaders Boundary-setting at work Mental health and resilience Cultural relevance in DEI and wellness programming Entrepreneurship and personal brand-building Employee Resource Group (ERG) keynotes and experiences Ideal for Heads of DEI, ERG leads, and culture teams running inclusion or wellbeing programming for Black employees and other under-served groups. CHROs and benefits leaders looking to refresh wellbeing offerings that have stopped landing. Women’s leadership networks and founder communities focused on burnout and boundary-setting. Conference and offsite programmers needing an experiential keynote rather than a panel discussion. Audience outcomes Practical language for setting boundaries without apology, drawn from her No Is A Full Sentence framework. A different reference point for what inclusive wellbeing looks like in practice, not in policy. Specific tools from the From Pain to Paradise method for processing setback and burnout. An experience employees describe afterwards as theirs, not the company’s, which is the test most wellbeing programmes fail.

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

Why organisations work with David Allen He speaks from inside the experience, not about it. A person describing decades of OCD, severe health anxiety and depression in their own words does work that a clinician or a policy lead cannot do. He is a trained Lived Experience Practitioner, formally accredited to use personal recovery to support others, and a People’s Champion with Champions for Change, the volunteer movement that succeeded the Time to Change campaign run by the charity Mind. The mental health talk, “Living with OCD: A Survivor’s Guide”, is autobiographical and practical at the same time: it covers triggers, daily impact and the coping strategies he has built, rather than general awareness messaging. He also offers researched social-history talks on Victorian England and storytelling travel sessions, which makes him a flexible choice for community groups, member associations and after-dinner programmes that want a single speaker for a varied evening. Biography highlights Lived Experience Practitioner working through Champions for Change, the volunteer movement that succeeded the Time to Change campaign of the mental health charity Mind. Holds the People’s Champion designation within that movement. Around 15 years as a professional public speaker, with festival appearances at Buxton, Edinburgh Fringe and Latitude. Member of the Dickens Fellowship, with a research focus on Victorian social and criminal history. Trained as a solicitor and as a primary school teacher before moving into full-time speaking. Regular speaker on the UK community-association circuit: U3A, Rotary, WI, Townswomen’s Guilds, Probus and 41 Clubs across the south east of England. Biography OCD is one of the most misunderstood common mental health conditions in the workplace. It is treated as a punchline about tidiness, when in clinical reality it is an anxiety disorder that can take hours out of a person’s day. Allen has lived with it since childhood, alongside depression and severe health anxiety, and has built a public talk out of that experience rather than out of theory. The credential that sits behind the talk is specific. After the pandemic, he trained as a Lived Experience Practitioner, the formal route by which people with their own history of mental illness are accredited to support others in recovery. He volunteers as a People’s Champion with Champions for Change, the local volunteer network that took over from the national Time to Change campaign run by Mind in 2022. That gives the OCD talk a grounding in something more than personal disclosure. The wider speaking career runs alongside that work. Allen trained as a solicitor and then as a primary school teacher before going full-time on the speaking circuit, where he has now been for around fifteen years. He is a member of the Dickens Fellowship and writes and performs researched talks on Victorian England, on Charles Dickens specifically, and on his own bicycle and hitchhiking journeys across Europe and North Africa. He has performed at Buxton Festival, the Edinburgh Fringe and Latitude. For a corporate audience, the value is narrow and specific: a first-person account of severe OCD, delivered by someone who has spent years working out how to talk about it in a room of strangers. For community associations, member groups and festival programmes, the range widens into Victorian history and travel storytelling. Key speaking topics Living with OCD and severe health anxiety Lived-experience mental health advocacy Stigma and mental illness in everyday life Victorian social history Charles Dickens and his world Long-distance bicycle and hitchhiking travel Ideal for Employee wellbeing programmes, mental health awareness weeks and stigma-reduction events inside large employers Healthcare and nursing audiences looking for a lived-experience voice alongside clinical content U3As, Rotary Clubs, WIs, Probus groups, 41 Clubs and similar community associations Literary festivals, history societies and after-dinner programmes booking storytelling sessions Audience outcomes A concrete understanding of what OCD looks like from the inside, beyond the cultural shorthand Specific coping strategies that one person has developed over decades of living with anxiety Permission to talk about mental health more openly inside teams and families For history audiences, a researched and entertaining window into Victorian social life

Why organisations work with Stephanie Davies A working method that gets cynical adult audiences to engage with behaviour change without the eye-rolling that usually accompanies culture training. A track record on hard conversations, with a programme at HSBC training more than 500 leaders to handle performance and feedback without flinching. A point of view on engagement grounded in published psychology, set out in her book Laughology: Improve Your Life with the Science of Laughter (Crown House). Two decades inside corporate culture work across HSBC, Nespresso, Nando’s, and government, so the content lands as practitioner advice rather than commentary. A delivery style that holds the room. The comedy training is a tool for retention and recall, not a gimmick layered on top of the content. Biography highlights Founder and CEO of Laughology, founded 2006. Author of Laughology: Improve Your Life with the Science of Laughter, Crown House Publishing. Master’s-level training in psychology, focused on humour and organisational performance. Designed and delivered performance-conversation training at HSBC for 500+ leaders. Culture and behaviour programmes with Nespresso, Nando’s, Virgin, O2, and UK government departments. Regular columnist for Training Journal; previously an award-winning stand-up comedian. Biography Most culture programmes lose the room in the first ten minutes. Adults arrive sceptical, the language is corporate, and the behaviours being asked of them feel performative. Laughology was built to solve that delivery problem. Stephanie Davies founded it in 2006 to pair applied psychology with the craft of stand-up, and uses humour as a mechanism for behaviour change rather than as decoration. The substance sits behind the style. Her book, Laughology: Improve Your Life with the Science of Laughter, sets out humour as a thinking skill, drawing on positive psychology and the cognitive research on how laughter shifts perspective and learning retention. Her master’s-level work in psychology runs through the firm’s programmes on engagement, leadership behaviour, and feedback. The client list reflects the practical bias. HSBC commissioned performance-conversation training for more than 500 leaders. Nespresso brought her in to strengthen retail leadership. Nando’s, Virgin, O2, and government departments have used Laughology for culture and behaviour work. Across these, the brief is consistent: get people to commit to a change in how they behave, not just understand why it matters. That practitioner record is what distinguishes her in a crowded happiness-at-work category. Most speakers in the space arrive from coaching, HR, or pop-psychology. Davies arrives from a working comedy career and a psychology specialism in humour, with twenty years of corporate delivery behind her. Key speaking topics Workplace engagement and culture change Psychology of humour at work Performance and feedback conversations Behaviour change in large organisations Leadership development and team culture Mental health and wellbeing in the workplace Resilience and positive psychology Ideal for CHROs and people directors running engagement or culture change agendas. L&D and OD leads commissioning leadership, feedback, or behaviour-change programmes. Boards and executive teams looking for a substantive culture session that an internal audience will actually engage with. Conference organisers programming a keynote that has to do real work on a wellbeing or culture theme. Audience outcomes A working model of humour as a behaviour-change tool, not as entertainment. Language and techniques for running performance and feedback conversations without avoidance. A clearer view of what drives engagement at the level of daily behaviour. Practical positive-psychology techniques for resilience and team morale. A session people actually remember, which is the precondition for any of the above changing behaviour.

Why organisations work with Kerry Daynes Twenty-five years assessing risk in prisons, secure hospitals and police investigations gives her workplace mental health content a substance that wellness-industry speakers cannot match. She translates clinical psychology into language line managers actually use, drawing on case material from homicide, stalking and serious violence work without sensationalising it. Sunday Times Top Ten bestselling author of “The Dark Side of the Mind”, with a second title longlisted for the Crime Writers Association Golden Dagger; her published thinking is on the public record, not bureau copy. Trustee of the Suzy Lamplugh Trust and patron of the National Centre for Domestic Violence, which makes her a credible voice on personal safety, stalking, and domestic abuse as workplace risks, not abstract HR topics. Biography highlights Consultant Forensic Psychologist, Chartered Psychologist, Associate Fellow of the British Psychological Society, HCPC-registered, Chartered Scientist Court-appointed expert witness in homicide, sexual assault and serious violence cases Author of “The Dark Side of the Mind” (Sunday Times Top Ten bestseller, Cassell 2019), “What Lies Buried” (Crime Writers Association Golden Dagger longlist) and “Is There a Psycho in Your Life?” “The Profiler” on Discovery’s “Faking It: Tears of a Crime”; documentary contributor for BBC, ITV, Channel 4, Channel 5, Netflix and the History Channel Trustee of the Suzy Lamplugh Trust; patron of the National Centre for Domestic Violence and Talking2Minds Former Lecturer in Applied Psychology, Manchester University Biography Most workplace conversations about mental health stop at awareness. They name the issue and offer a helpline. They rarely give managers the tools to interpret what they are actually seeing in a colleague, a candidate, or a customer. That gap is where Kerry Daynes works. Her grounding is forensic. Twenty-five years inside prisons, secure psychiatric hospitals and major police investigations, including work as a court-appointed expert witness in homicide, sexual assault and serious violence cases. She began her career at HMP Wakefield at twenty-one and went on to lecture in applied psychology at Manchester University. The published record carries the argument further. “The Dark Side of the Mind” was a Sunday Times Top Ten bestseller; “What Lies Buried” was longlisted for the Crime Writers Association Golden Dagger for non-fiction. As “The Profiler” on Discovery’s “Faking It: Tears of a Crime”, and through documentary contributions across BBC, ITV, Channel 4 and Netflix, she has built a public body of work that takes clinical material seriously without flattening it into entertainment. For corporate audiences, she draws on that material to address how people actually behave under pressure, how risk presents before it escalates, and how organisations can build mental health and personal safety practice that does more than tick a box. Her roles with the Suzy Lamplugh Trust and the National Centre for Domestic Violence give her work on stalking, coercion and domestic abuse a credibility that translates directly into safeguarding and duty-of-care conversations. Key speaking topics Workplace mental health Behavioural risk and threat assessment Personal safety, stalking and coercive behaviour Psychology of motivation and human behaviour Resilience in high-pressure roles Communication and influence under stress Ideal for CHROs, heads of wellbeing and people directors building substantive mental health strategy Heads of security, risk and safeguarding addressing personal safety and threat behaviour Leadership teams in healthcare, policing, legal services and frontline professions exposed to vicarious trauma Conference audiences in HR, EAP, occupational health and corporate safety sectors Audience outcomes A clearer way to distinguish stress, distress and behavioural risk in colleagues and clients Practical language for managers who currently avoid mental health conversations A grounded view of stalking, coercion and domestic abuse as workplace safeguarding issues Insight into how forensic psychologists assess motivation, deception and threat, applied to everyday organisational life A more confident, less squeamish stance on the human realities behind wellbeing policy

Why organisations work with Gordon Buchanan A working BBC broadcaster, not a retired one. Three decades of presenter-led natural history series mean he holds an audience the moment he steps on stage, before the substantive content begins. A credible male voice on mental health, grounded in In the Hide: How the Natural World Saved My Life, a Sunday Times bestseller. The story is his own, which is why audiences listen. A genuine conservationist with institutional backing: MBE for services to conservation and wildlife film-making, patronages of Trees for Life and The Gorilla Organization, ambassadorship of the Scottish Wildlife Trust. Stories from inside hides in Svalbard, Ellesmere, Mumbai and Mongolia, used to make points about composure, patience and decision-making under sustained physical pressure rather than as travelogue. Range across the brief: keynote, after-dinner, fireside, awards host. The presenter craft is the asset that makes the substantive content land in a corporate room. Biography highlights Scottish wildlife cameraman, filmmaker and presenter; over thirty years with the BBC and other major broadcasters. BBC series include The Bear Family and Me, The Polar Bear Family and Me, Snow Wolf Family and Me, Gorilla Family and Me, Elephant Family and Me, Tribes, Predators and Me, Life in the Snow, Our Changing Planet and Big Cats 24/7. MBE, 2020 New Year Honours, for services to conservation and wildlife film-making. Honorary Doctorate, University of Stirling; Honorary Fellowship, Royal Scottish Geographical Society; Glenfiddich Spirit of Scotland Award (Environment), 2013. Author of In the Hide: How the Natural World Saved My Life (Penguin, 2025), instant Sunday Times bestseller. Patron of Trees for Life and The Gorilla Organization; Ambassador of the Scottish Wildlife Trust. Biography Most conversations about resilience in organisations stall at vocabulary. People know what they are supposed to say. They struggle to say anything useful about how a person actually stays functional through sustained pressure, repeated setback and long stretches of discomfort. A voice that has lived the question, in concrete and unglamorous detail, lands differently in the room. Three decades of BBC natural history work have put Gordon Buchanan inside cramped camera hides in Svalbard, Ellesmere, Mumbai and Mongolia, often for weeks at a time, in extreme cold, sleep deprivation and physical risk. Series including The Bear Family and Me, Snow Wolf Family and Me, Gorilla Family and Me, Tribes, Predators and Me and Big Cats 24/7 have made him one of the most widely watched presenters in British wildlife television. The published work behind the keynote is In the Hide: How the Natural World Saved My Life, an instant Sunday Times bestseller from Penguin in 2025. It is an honest account of a hard childhood in Glasgow and on Mull, the mental-health pressures that followed a public career, and the role of routine, family, exercise and the natural world in staying well. The book is the reason corporate audiences hear him as a credible voice on men’s mental health rather than a wildlife presenter making a side argument. Institutional recognition tracks the conservation half of the same career: an MBE in the 2020 New Year Honours for services to conservation and wildlife film-making, an Honorary Doctorate from the University of Stirling, an Honorary Fellowship of the Royal Scottish Geographical Society, and active patronages of Trees for Life, The Gorilla Organization and the Scottish Wildlife Trust. Key speaking topics Mental health, resilience and the restorative role of the natural world Men’s mental health and the cost of silence Storytelling as a leadership and engagement tool Patience, composure and decision-making under sustained pressure Wildlife conservation and the climate-nature agenda Connection to nature as a workplace wellbeing input After-dinner storytelling drawn from three decades of BBC filming Ideal for HR, people and wellbeing leads designing mental-health programmes that need a credible male voice Leadership offsites and senior partner retreats where the conversation needs to go beyond resilience language Sustainability, ESG and conservation-linked events anchored by a recognised BBC presenter After-dinner and awards-night programmes where presenter craft matters as much as topic Audience outcomes A more honest internal vocabulary for mental health, particularly among men who do not usually engage with the topic A specific picture of what sustained composure under pressure looks like in practice, drawn from filming conditions in extreme environments A renewed case for nature, routine and physical activity as legitimate wellbeing inputs rather than soft extras A clearer link between the conservation agenda the organisation talks about and the human story behind it Footage and stories that audiences remember long after the session, useful for downstream internal communication

Why organisations work with Rachel Sheerin Speaks to burnout as a performance problem, not a wellness problem, which lets senior teams act on it without rebranding it as HR theatre. Behavioural-analyst training underpins the work, so the content has a diagnostic spine rather than relying on personal-story keynote tropes. TEDx talk “How to Burnout and Be Successful” reached a wide audience and gives the topic a recognisable hook for internal marketing of an event. Hospitality and sales operating background means she reads the room of a client-facing workforce accurately, including Ritz-Carlton, Marriott and SHRM audiences. Doubles as a tested conference emcee, which is useful when the buyer wants a single voice to anchor a multi-day programme rather than a one-off keynote. Biography highlights Certified Professional Behavioral Analyst. TEDx speaker: “How to Burnout and Be Successful,” TEDxPuntaCanaWomen. Author, “Better All The Time” (2024) and “BETTER: How to live, lead and succeed” (Hawthorn Road Press, 2023). Named NACE Speaker of the Year, 2019. Featured in Inc. Magazine; host of the podcast “F THIS S with Rachel Sheerin.” Clients include The Ritz-Carlton, Marriott International, Walmart, Freddie Mac, Berkshire Hathaway, SHRM and the James Beard Foundation. Biography Burnout has become the workforce conversation that organisations cannot afford to keep handling at the edges. The cost shows up first in the highest performers, the people whose output the rest of the operation is built on. Standard wellbeing benefits do not move that needle. Rachel Sheerin works in that gap. A Certified Professional Behavioral Analyst with a former career in hospitality and events sales leadership, she treats burnout as a behavioural and operational problem rather than a feelings problem. Her TEDx talk “How to Burnout and Be Successful” framed the territory for a wide audience and remains the most-cited entry point into her work. Her two books, “BETTER: How to live, lead and succeed” (Hawthorn Road Press, 2023) and “Better All The Time” (2024), set out a practical method for high performers who keep over-extending themselves. The same content reaches a recurring audience through the podcast “F THIS S with Rachel Sheerin” and through coverage in Inc. Magazine. She was named Speaker of the Year by NACE in 2019, and now works regularly with clients including The Ritz-Carlton, Marriott International, Walmart, Berkshire Hathaway, Freddie Mac, SHRM and the James Beard Foundation. The audiences are typically sales, service and operating leaders inside organisations that depend on people performing at a high level in customer-facing roles. Key speaking topics Burnout prevention and recovery Self-leadership and energy management Employee engagement High-performer psychology Sales authenticity and motivation Workplace culture and wellbeing Conference emcee and event hosting Ideal for CHROs, heads of people and chief wellbeing officers in service, hospitality and sales-driven organisations Sales leadership audiences in client-facing industries Annual conferences for associations and franchises that need a keynote plus emcee in a single voice Post-merger or post-restructure events where the workforce is visibly fatigued Audience outcomes A clearer read on where burnout is showing up inside the team and what is driving it Practical language for talking about workload, energy and recovery in a working environment Tools high performers can apply without giving up the standard they hold themselves to Renewed engagement and focus in audiences entering a demanding quarter or season

Why organisations work with Alex Staniforth Both of Staniforth’s Everest attempts (2014, 2015) ended in catastrophe, which means his argument about resilience, failure, and redefining success is not constructed from triumph. That credibility is difficult to replicate. His personal mental health disclosure; depression, anxiety, eating disorders, epilepsy, and a lifelong stammer, is specific and public. It allows him to reach parts of a leadership audience that pure performance speakers cannot, including people who are privately struggling. The ‘Resilience Rucksack’ gives audiences a named, practical framework to take away: not just an inspiring story, but a set of tools mapped to real workplace pressures. As co-founder of Mind Over Mountains, a national UK charity combining outdoor experience with professional mental health support, he brings an institutional track record to conversations about psychological safety that extends well beyond the stage. His Honorary Doctorate (DLitt) from the University of Chester, awarded in 2025 for his contribution to young people’s mental health, positions him credibly across both the performance and the clinical ends of the wellbeing conversation. Biography highlights Survived the 2014 Khumbu Icefall avalanche and the 2015 Nepal earthquake, the two most significant disasters in Everest history, on consecutive attempts, as a teenager First and fastest person to complete all 446 Nuttall mountains in England and Wales under human power in 45 days; fastest ever ascent of all 100 UK county tops (72 days) Author of Icefall (Coventry House Publishing, 2016) and Another Peak (2019) Co-founder, Mind Over Mountains: national UK charity restoring mental health through therapeutic outdoor programmes (est. 2020) Honorary Doctorate (DLitt), University of Chester, 2025: for outstanding contribution to young people’s mental health services Prime Minister’s Points of Light award, 2023; Pride of Britain Granada Reports Fundraiser of the Year, 2017; over £150,000 raised for charity across endurance challenges Biography Everest has a way of clarifying what resilience actually means. Alex Staniforth attempted the summit twice – the 2014 season ended by the Khumbu Icefall avalanche, the 2015 attempt halted by the Nepal earthquake – and returned from neither having reached the top. Both experiences form the foundation of his argument to organisations: that the most useful preparation is not for success, but for what happens when things go wrong. Since those expeditions, Staniforth has completed a series of documented endurance records. He is the first and fastest person to run and cycle all 446 Nuttall mountains in England and Wales in 45 days and holds the record for the fastest ascent of all 100 UK county tops. He is the author of Icefall and Another Peak, and in 2020 co-founded Mind Over Mountains, a national UK charity that combines outdoor experience with professional mental health support. What separates his contribution from most adventure-based speaking is where it goes beyond the summit metaphor. Staniforth has spoken publicly about depression, anxiety, and eating disorders experienced as an endurance athlete: alongside epilepsy and a lifelong stammer. This specificity allows him to speak credibly in mental health conversations where most performance speakers cannot go. His practical framework, the ‘Resilience Rucksack’, translates that experience into tools that leadership audiences can name and apply. His keynotes have been delivered to Rolls-Royce Submarines, Samsung, Bank of America, Accenture, FedEx, and the NHS, among others. He was awarded an Honorary Doctorate (DLitt) by the University of Chester in 2025 for his contribution to young people’s mental health, and received the Prime Minister’s Points of Light award in 2023. He is an ICF-trained coach and certified Gazing Red2Blue practitioner. Key speaking topics Resilience under pressure Mental fitness and sustainable performance Leadership through adversity and change Burnout prevention and psychological safety Goal setting and redefining success Team performance in uncertainty Wellbeing as a performance foundation Ideal for Senior leadership teams navigating organisational change or post-disruption recovery CHROs and people leads building mental health or wellbeing programmes with senior buy-in Leadership development and high-potential programmes requiring a resilience anchor Corporate conferences where performance and wellbeing are a combined agenda item Audience outcomes A practical, named framework (the ‘Resilience Rucksack’) for maintaining performance during setbacks, change, and high pressure A more specific understanding of the relationship between mental fitness and sustained performance – not as a trade-off, but as the same investment Increased confidence among leaders in modelling openness around mental health, and in recognising early warning signs in their teams A shift in how failure and setback are framed – from evidence of inadequacy to material for growth Reference points from extreme conditions that translate directly to the pressures of demanding professional environments

Why organisations work with Troy Deeney He speaks from a verifiable record of collapse and recovery: prison in 2012, back in the Watford team within weeks of release, club captain inside two years, and the side’s all-time leading Premier League scorer by the end of his Watford career. His material on mental health is not theoretical. He has written publicly about counselling, grief and identity in Redemption: My Story, and brings that into the room without the polish that usually sands the substance off. He has run a real campaign, not just commented on one. Where’s My History? involved a YouGov teacher survey, a 50,000-signature petition, a Channel 4 documentary and direct engagement with the Department for Education. He is a working broadcaster, which means the room gets a confident communicator. Sky Sports EFL, TalkSport, BBC Sounds and the Deeney Talks podcast are part of his weekly diet. He works well in fireside and Q&A formats, which suits clients who want a real conversation with a senior audience rather than a scripted keynote. Biography highlights Made 500+ professional appearances and scored 160+ career goals across Watford, Birmingham City and Forest Green Rovers. Captain of Watford for the second half of his career there; club record Premier League scorer; FA Cup finalist and promotion winner. Author of Troy Deeney: Redemption: My Story (Hachette / Octopus), reviewed widely and named “Footie book of the year” by The Sun. Fronted Troy Deeney: Where’s My History? on Channel 4 (2022), a 60-minute documentary on the lack of Black, Asian and minority ethnic content in the UK school curriculum. Pundit on Sky Sports EFL, regular on TalkSport, co-host of BBC Sounds’ Football Firsts with Jermain Defoe, and host of the Deeney Talks podcast. Served as head coach of Forest Green Rovers after a player-coach role, holding a UEFA A coaching licence. Biography Watford were 2-1 down to Leicester in the 2013 Championship play-off semi-final when Troy Deeney scored in the 97th minute to put them in the final. The goal is still played on highlight reels. Eighteen months earlier he had been in HMP Birmingham, serving time for affray, and had assumed his career was finished. That gap, between prison cell and one of the most famous goals in modern English football, is what gives his speaking material weight. Redemption: My Story, published by Hachette in 2021, is his own account of the road between the two: a childhood on one of Europe’s largest council estates, a father who dealt drugs and went in and out of prison, three months inside, counselling, and the discipline of rebuilding. The Sun named it football book of the year. It is unusually candid about mental health, grief and the specific work of recovery. Since retiring from playing, Deeney has built a parallel career as a broadcaster and campaigner. He is a Sky Sports EFL pundit, a regular voice on TalkSport, and co-hosts BBC Sounds’ Football Firsts with Jermain Defoe. He fronted Where’s My History?, a Channel 4 documentary on the absence of Black, Asian and minority ethnic content in the national curriculum, supported by a YouGov teacher survey, a public petition and an open letter to the Secretary of State for Education. He spent a season as player-coach and then head coach at Forest Green Rovers in 2023 to 2024. For senior audiences the value is specific. He talks about what actually changed in counselling, how he handled a dressing room, why public failure is survivable, and what the inside of a serious personal reset looks like. The register is plain, unsanitised and grown-up, which is rare in the speaker market for this kind of material. Key speaking topics Resilience and recovery after public failure Self-leadership under pressure Mental health, identity and life after sport Captaincy and leading a dressing room Race, education and social change in the UK Storytelling and authentic communication Ideal for Leadership offsites and senior team away days where a candid personal-story session is more useful than another expert lecture Employee engagement, DEI and mental health programmes that need a credible male voice on vulnerability and recovery Sales kick-offs, customer events and after-dinner formats wanting a sports-world figure with substance, not just anecdotes Sport, media, education and youth-focused organisations working on race, opportunity and curriculum Audience outcomes A clearer view of what recovery from public failure actually requires, beyond motivational language. Practical insight into how a captain holds a dressing room together through pressure, scrutiny and bad results. A more honest framework for talking about mental health with senior male audiences who tend to discount the subject. A specific case study in turning personal experience into an evidenced public campaign, useful for organisations thinking about advocacy and voice.

Why organisations work with Luke Tyburski He talks about depression, eating disorders and suicidal ideation from the inside, which lets internal wellbeing leads open conversations that polished clinical content does not reach. He pairs the personal material with two named frameworks, K.E.N. for resilience and View-Think-Act for daily mindset, so audiences leave with a structure rather than a story. The 2,000km Morocco-to-Monaco Ultimate Triathlon is a documented world-first with an award-winning film attached, giving the proof point credibility that generic “extreme athlete” billing does not. He has been booked by national sporting teams, embassies and global companies across 16 countries, which signals he can read a senior corporate room as well as a sports audience. He is an accredited executive coach (ICF and EMCC), which means the resilience and mindset frameworks he delivers from stage are the same ones he uses in one-to-one work with senior leaders, not repackaged motivational content. Biography highlights Former professional footballer whose career ended after seven surgeries. Created and completed the world-first 2,000km Ultimate Triathlon from Morocco to Monaco in 12 days, filmed as the award-winning documentary “The Ultimate Triathlon” (2016) and recounted in his book “Chasing Extreme”. 2023 TEDx speaker, “Generate Momentum With 1% Thinking”. Has spoken in 16 countries across five continents, including for national sporting bodies, embassies and global companies. Accredited executive coach (ICF and EMCC), working one-to-one with executives, founders and senior leadership teams. Featured on The Rich Roll Podcast and Michael Gervais’s Finding Mastery, and in The Guardian and The Huffington Post. Biography Most mental health content for executives lives in two registers: clinical advice from professionals who have not experienced what they describe, and motivational stories that stop at “I came through it.” Luke Tyburski works the gap between the two. He talks about his own depression, eating disorder and two moments standing on bridges in plain language, then turns the experience into corporate frameworks that wellbeing leads can use after he leaves the room. The platform for that work is unusual. A football career ending in seven surgeries pushed him into ultra-endurance, where he ran the Sahara, descended Everest, crossed a Chinese forest without food or water, and built a 2,000km, 12-day triathlon from Morocco to Monaco that became the basis of the 2016 documentary “The Ultimate Triathlon”. He wrote about the project in his book “Chasing Extreme”. The speaking work draws on that material but is structured around two named tools. As an accredited executive coach (ICF and EMCC), he uses the same frameworks in one-to-one work with executives and leadership teams that he brings to the stage. K.E.N. is his resilience framework for individuals and teams under sustained pressure. View-Think-Act, the spine of his “Mastering Mindset” keynote, breaks daily performance into how people read a situation, what they tell themselves about it, and what they do next. He presented the underlying ideas in a 2023 TEDx talk, “Generate Momentum With 1% Thinking”. The audience has widened well beyond sport. Over more than a decade he has worked with national sporting teams, embassies and global companies across 16 countries on five continents. The through-line is the same: a usable language for performance and mental health that does not collapse when the conversation gets serious. Key speaking topics Mental health and wellbeing in the workplace Resilience and recovery under sustained pressure Performance mindset and daily habits Self-leadership through setback and injury Lived experience of depression and suicidality Endurance and adventure as corporate metaphor Ideal for CHROs and wellbeing leads designing serious mental health programmes beyond awareness campaigns Sales and high-performance teams operating under sustained targets and travel pressure Leadership offsites where the brief includes resilience and personal sustainability Conferences in sport, insurance, finance and professional services that want a credible mental health voice Audience outcomes A clearer language for talking about mental health internally without it becoming a clinical or HR conversation The K.E.N. framework as a shared reference for how teams respond to setback and pressure View-Think-Act as a daily structure for individual performance Permission to acknowledge that high performers can be unwell, and a model for what to do about it A concrete account of what sustained recovery looks like from inside it