Multigenerational Workplace speakers

Why organisations work with Adam Kingl A decade-plus of original research into how Generation Y expects to work and be led, conducted while at London Business School and Duke Corporate Education, now applied to advising boards on talent and culture strategy. Author of two books from mainstream business publishers (Next Generation Leadership with HarperCollins, Sparking Success with Kogan Page), the second shortlisted for the Business Book Awards 2024 in the Smart Thinking category. Primary research inside the creative industries (Carnegie Hall, Disney Imagineering, Broadway theatre, the writers’ room of Friends) translated into leadership practice for companies including Pixar, Panasonic, Bosch and Netflix. Very few leadership speakers work from that source base. Adjunct teaching at UCL School of Management, Hult Ashridge, Imperial College Business School and the Møller Institute at Churchill College, Cambridge. These appointments come through competitive academic review and carry live executive programme responsibility. A decade as Executive Director of Thought Leadership at London Business School and Regional Managing Director (Europe) at Duke Corporate Education. He has designed and run executive development at scale, which shapes how he reads a boardroom. Biography highlights Author of Next Generation Leadership (HarperCollins, 2020) and Sparking Success (Kogan Page, 2023), the second shortlisted for the Business Book Awards 2024 in the Smart Thinking category Former Executive Director of Thought Leadership and Learning Solutions at London Business School (nearly a decade in post) Former Regional Managing Director (Europe) at Duke Corporate Education, Fuqua School of Business, Duke University Adjunct Faculty at UCL School of Management, Hult Ashridge International Business School and Imperial College Business School Associate of the Møller Institute at Churchill College, University of Cambridge Contributor and interviewee for the Financial Times, Forbes, Fortune, The Guardian, Fast Company and The Sunday Times Biography 80% of CEOs name innovation and creativity among their top three priorities. In the same surveyed organisations, 94% of employees rate their company as poor at both. That gap, between what executives say matters and what their organisations actually produce, is the starting point for most of Adam Kingl’s work. Kingl spent nearly a decade as Executive Director of Thought Leadership at London Business School, then led Duke Corporate Education’s European business as Regional Managing Director. He now teaches at UCL School of Management, Hult Ashridge, Imperial College Business School and the Møller Institute at Churchill College, Cambridge. His material is built and tested inside those programmes before it reaches any commercial audience. Next Generation Leadership (HarperCollins, 2020) grew out of a decade of original research into how Generation Y expects to work and be led. It treats generational change as a management design problem. Kingl’s argument is that the old playbook, built on hierarchy and productivity, produces the disengagement and attrition the same playbook is then used to diagnose. Sparking Success (Kogan Page, 2023), shortlisted for the Business Book Awards in the Smart Thinking category, goes inside the arts. Carnegie Hall, Disney Imagineering, Broadway theatre and the writers’ room of Friends are interviewed on how they produce creative output under commercial pressure. Those habits are then mapped into corporate practice at Pixar, Bosch, Panasonic and Netflix. His advisory work spans the BBC, BP, Disney, HSBC, LVMH, Shell and the European Central Bank. Key speaking topics Generational paradigms in leadership Creativity and creative mindset in business Culture and talent strategy Future of work Leadership and management innovation Executive education and capability building Ideal for CHROs and chief people officers reshaping leadership development for a multigenerational workforce CEOs and executive committees where stated innovation and engagement ambitions are outrunning the culture and talent practices meant to deliver them Boards and executive education programmes investing in next-generation leadership capability Learning and development leaders designing curricula for leadership at mid-career and senior level Audience outcomes A sharper diagnostic for why stated priorities on innovation and engagement keep failing to show up in organisational behaviour A set of creative practices borrowed from arts organisations (including how Pixar, Disney Imagineering and the Friends writers’ room actually work) and a route to adopting them in a corporate setting A clearer read on what younger talent actually expects from work, and which of those expectations are non-negotiable for retention A vocabulary for talking about generational differences in the workplace that avoids the usual folklore about “millennials” and “Gen Z”

Why organisations work with Dr Alex George He brings a clinician’s framework to workplace wellbeing, grounding corporate mental health conversations in the same preventative medicine thinking used on an emergency medicine ward. His policy work as the UK Government’s Youth Mental Health Ambassador gives him rare authority on what structural mental health support actually looks like at scale, from curriculum design to Early Support Hubs. Two Sunday Times bestsellers, Live Well Every Day and The Mind Manual, give his sessions a concrete toolkit audiences can take away, not a set of slogans. He connects the wellbeing agenda to the emerging workforce, with direct credibility on Gen Z mental health, early career burnout, and the intergenerational shift inside organisations. He speaks publicly about losing his brother Llyr to suicide in 2020, which turns the topic from corporate compliance into a conversation leaders feel obligated to lead. Biography highlights NHS-trained emergency medicine doctor, University Hospital Lewisham, London Medical degree, University of Exeter Medical School (2015); honorary degree from the University of Exeter (2024) First UK Government Youth Mental Health Ambassador, appointed by the Prime Minister, Department for Education (2021-2024) Author of Sunday Times bestsellers Live Well Every Day and The Mind Manual Host of Stompcast and The Waiting Room, walking and health interview podcasts Campaigner behind the Early Support Hubs initiative, which secured nearly 5 million pounds of UK government funding for open-access youth mental health drop-ins Biography Most workplace wellbeing programmes are built by committees. Dr Alex George builds them the way an emergency medicine doctor assesses a patient: triage the real risks first, then design habits that people will actually repeat. That clinical instinct sits underneath everything he does on stage. Training at the University of Exeter Medical School and working in emergency medicine at University Hospital Lewisham gave him a direct view of how mental and physical health present together, and how late most people arrive for help. His public profile opened a second track. In February 2021 the Prime Minister appointed him the UK’s first Youth Mental Health Ambassador, based in the Department for Education, where he spent four years shaping policy on school and college support, curriculum, and early intervention. The campaign that defines that period is Early Support Hubs. Working with the Fund the Hubs Coalition, Mind, and YoungMinds, he pushed for walk-in mental health services for young people and helped secure nearly 5 million pounds of initial UK government investment. The same logic drives his writing. Live Well Every Day and The Mind Manual, both Sunday Times bestsellers, turn clinical ideas into daily practice for a non-medical reader. For corporate audiences, that body of work translates into an unusually practical session: clinician-grade framing of the mental health risks inside a workforce, paired with habits leaders can install this quarter. In 2024 the University of Exeter awarded him an honorary degree in recognition of the campaigning. Key speaking topics Workplace mental health and employee wellbeing Preventative health and mental fitness Youth mental health and the Gen Z workforce Burnout, resilience, and recovery Public health communication and behaviour change Suicide prevention and mental health literacy for leaders Ideal for CHROs and Chief Wellbeing Officers redesigning mental health provision beyond EAP minimums Leadership teams accountable for burnout, attrition, and engagement metrics Early careers, graduate, and Gen Z talent programmes Healthcare, education, and public sector organisations with frontline workforce pressures Audience outcomes A clinician’s read on which mental health risks are most material to their workforce right now A concrete set of daily habits, drawn from his books, that leaders can model and cascade A sharper understanding of how Gen Z employees experience mental health differently, and what that means for policy and line management Practical language for leaders to open mental health conversations without overstepping into clinical territory A clear view of what structural mental health support looks like, drawn from his government policy work

Why organisations work with Alexis Abramson A PhD in Gerontology from USC’s Leonard Davis School combined with 25 years consulting the product and marketing teams of L’Oréal Paris, Marriott, Walmart, and Procter & Gamble. The academic credential and the commercial track record rarely come together in the same person. Direct product build experience, not commentary. She helped launch the AARP Innovation Lab as Entrepreneur-in-Residence, built BMO Private Bank’s enCircle caregiving programme, and developed Century 21’s MatureMoves programme for agents selling into the boomer market. Two decades of quoted commentary in TIME, The Wall Street Journal, Forbes, Financial Times, and Entrepreneur, and hundreds of appearances on NBC’s Today, CNN, and MSNBC as the on-air expert on ageing and generational trends. The Emmy and Gracie Awards confirm she can explain a demographic shift in plain English. Ten years as a primary caregiver for her grandmother inform her work on caregiving as a workforce productivity issue. The material lands because she has lived it. Biography highlights PhD in Gerontology, University of Southern California’s Leonard Davis School of Gerontology Former AARP Entrepreneur-in-Residence; led the launch of the AARP Innovation Lab Developed BMO Private Bank’s enCircle caregiving programme, Century 21’s MatureMoves programme, and Delta Airlines’ mature-adult frequent flyer programme Consulted for L’Oréal Paris, Walmart, Marriott, Comcast, Northwestern Mutual, Procter & Gamble, Kimberly-Clark, Philips, Humana, Ameriprise, and Harvard University Featured in TIME, Forbes, The Wall Street Journal, Entrepreneur, Financial Times, and People; on-air expert for NBC’s Today, CNN, CBS, FOX, and MSNBC Emmy and Gracie Award-winning broadcast journalist Author of The Ultimate Longevity Guide, The Ultimate Caregiver, The 55+ Fact Book, STOP FRAUD, and Home Safety for Seniors Biography The 50+ consumer market is now the largest block of discretionary spending in most developed economies, and brands still misread it. Marketing teams design for a demographic that has not existed since the early 2000s. Product teams assume needs that never land. This is the territory Alexis Abramson has worked inside for 25 years. She trained first as a gerontologist at the University of Southern California’s Leonard Davis School, then moved into commercial consulting. Her client list includes L’Oréal Paris, Walmart, Marriott, Procter & Gamble, Kimberly-Clark, Comcast, and Northwestern Mutual. Her work is concrete. As AARP’s Entrepreneur-in-Residence she played a leading role in the launch of the AARP Innovation Lab. She built BMO Private Bank’s enCircle caregiving programme and developed Century 21’s MatureMoves programme for agents selling into the boomer market. She also shaped Delta Airlines’ frequent flyer programme for mature adults. Each required translating demographic research into a product a real customer would use. She is also the author of The Ultimate Longevity Guide, The Ultimate Caregiver, and STOP FRAUD, and an Emmy and Gracie Award-winning broadcast journalist. Hundreds of appearances on NBC’s Today, CNN, and MSNBC have built a skill most academics never develop. She can explain a demographic shift in two sentences an executive team actually remembers. Key speaking topics The longevity economy and 50+ consumer behaviour Multigenerational workforce dynamics Generational marketing strategy Product and service design for ageing populations Caregiving as a workforce productivity issue Demographic change as commercial opportunity Ideal for Marketing and brand leaders responsible for growth in mature or multigenerational consumer segments Chief Product Officers and product strategy teams designing for the 50+ market CHROs and people leaders running workforces with four or five generations in the room Board and C-suite teams setting strategy against long-horizon demographic change Audience outcomes A sharper read on where the 50+ consumer is actually spending, and where brands are consistently losing the sale Concrete examples of age-inclusive product and marketing design, drawn from her work with named brands A realistic view of caregiving as a workforce productivity issue with direct cost implications A framework for making the five-generation workforce a source of commercial advantage

Why organisations work with Amanda Hamilton A clinical nutrition practitioner who can hold a corporate audience. The combination of qualified therapist credentials and 25 years of mainstream BBC presenting is what allows her to land technical content on gut health, fasting and longevity without losing the room. Genuine subject authority on women’s mid-life health, an area most wellbeing programmes underserve. The Women’s Reset programme is built specifically around women aged 40+, the cohort employers are most often losing. A bestselling thesis on the gut-health-and-weight relationship, The G Plan Diet, that pre-dated the mainstream gut microbiome conversation and is still in print. Practical, non-dogmatic translation of biohacking, fasting and longevity science. Audiences leave with things they can actually do on Monday, not a manifesto. Biography highlights Nutritional therapist with 25+ years’ practice; member of the British Association of Nutritional Therapists and associate member of the Royal Society of Medicine. Co-host of the BBC’s Something for the Weekend with Tim Lovejoy and Simon Rimmer, and presenter on How to Live Longer, The Truth About… and The Spa of Embarrassing Illnesses. Author of The G Plan Diet (2017, with Hannah Ebelthite), Eat, Fast, Slim (Watkins, 2013), Life-Changing Weight Loss (Piatkus, 2008) and LifeDetox (Piatkus, 2007). Founder of The Women’s Reset, an app-based programme on nutrition, exercise, mindset and healthcare for women aged 40+. Currently pursuing an MSc in Obesity Science at Robert Gordon University. Past corporate and consulting work spans Marbella Club, MyFitnessPal, Nairns and OakNorth, alongside Harley Street longevity practice. Biography Most corporate wellness content fails the credibility test the moment a clinically literate employee asks a follow-up question. Amanda Hamilton has built a 25-year career on the opposite premise: that workforce audiences will engage seriously with nutrition, longevity and gut health, but only when the speaker can hold the science as well as the room. Her clinical grounding sits with the British Association of Nutritional Therapists and the Royal Society of Medicine, and she is currently pursuing an MSc in Obesity Science at Robert Gordon University. Her broadcast career, including years co-hosting the BBC’s Something for the Weekend and presenting How to Live Longer, taught her how to make that science conversational without watering it down. The G Plan Diet, published in 2017 with Hannah Ebelthite, brought the gut-weight relationship into the mainstream conversation before the microbiome became a wellness category in its own right. Earlier books with Piatkus and Watkins covered fasting, weight loss and detox protocols, work she has since extended through retreats, the Women’s Reset programme for women aged 40+, and Harley Street longevity practice. For corporate audiences this resolves a familiar problem. Wellbeing programmes lose authority when they over-promise; they lose engagement when they under-deliver. She works in the narrow band between clinical caution and practical usefulness, which is why she lands well with mid-life cohorts that have heard the generic version too many times. Key speaking topics Nutrition and gut health Longevity and healthspan Women’s mid-life health and menopause Corporate wellbeing and workforce vitality Fasting and metabolic health Biohacking and human optimisation Ideal for Heads of HR, reward and benefits, and wellbeing leads designing or refreshing employee health programmes Companies focused on retaining and supporting women aged 40+, including senior female talent Health, hospitality and wellness brands seeking a clinically credible voice on consumer-facing nutrition Audience outcomes A clearer view of which workplace health interventions are evidence-backed and which are not A practical understanding of how nutrition, sleep and fasting protocols affect energy and performance A more informed conversation about women’s mid-life health that goes beyond menopause headlines Specific, lifestyle-level changes employees can apply without needing a clinical referral

Why organisations work with Andrew Scott His published distinction between an “ageing society” and a “longevity society”, developed in The Lancet Healthy Longevity and across his books, gives leadership teams a concrete alternative to deficit-focused demographic thinking, with direct implications for workforce design, business model adaptation, and long-term investment. His two books, The 100-Year Life (over one million copies sold) and The Longevity Imperative (2024, shortlisted for the FT–Schroders Business Book of the Year), translate macroeconomic and health research into specific decisions organisations face: how to structure careers, what skills to invest in, how to redesign pension and benefits frameworks. His academic research, including a paper in Nature Aging co-authored with David Sinclair and Martin Ellison, connects macro-economic strategy to the science of ageing itself, giving organisations a basis for anticipating how advances in health and geroscience will affect labour supply and workforce composition over the next two decades. As leader of the CEPR Research Policy Network on the Economics of Longevity and Ageing, he has an overall view of policy, academic research, and applied economic intelligence: not a commentator on the trend, but one of the people who defines the research agenda. His advisory roles at the UK Office for Budget Responsibility, and his prior work with HM Treasury and the Bank of England, mean he can brief boards on the regulatory and fiscal changes that longevity economics will drive – before those changes arrive on the agenda. Biography highlights Professor of Economics at London Business School; Principal Scientist (Economics) at the Ellison Institute of Technology, Oxford CBE, 2026 New Year’s Honours – for services to economics, research and public discourse Co-author of The 100-Year Life (with Lynda Gratton) – over one million copies sold; runner-up for the FT/McKinsey Business Book of the Year Award Author of The Longevity Imperative (2024) – shortlisted for the FT–Schroders Business Book of the Year; named one of the FT’s best summer economics reads Research Fellow, Centre for Economic Policy Research; leads the CEPR Research Policy Network on the Economics of Longevity and Ageing; member of the WEF Global Future Council on Healthy Ageing and Longevity Former Non-Executive Director, UK Financial Services Authority; former Managing Editor, Royal Economic Society’s Economic Journal; advisory board member, UK Office for Budget Responsibility; adviser to HM Treasury and the Bank of England Biography The 100-Year Life, co-authored by Andrew Scott and Lynda Gratton, has sold over a million copies. What made it resonate was not the data on life expectancy; it was the argument that longer lives require a fundamentally different structure for careers, organisations, and economic systems. That argument sits at the centre of Scott’s research at London Business School and the Ellison Institute of Technology in Oxford. Scott’s central distinction – between an “ageing society” and a “longevity society” – reframes longevity from a background risk into a strategic imperative. An ageing society focuses on supporting rising numbers of older people. The longevity society, as Scott defines it in The Lancet Healthy Longevity, demands that organisations prepare for fifty-year careers, not just older employees. The implication for workforce strategy, benefits design, and long-term investment is structural, not cosmetic. The Longevity Imperative (2024, shortlisted for the FT–Schroders Business Book of the Year) extends the analysis from individual careers into system-level change: health systems, fiscal policy, financial markets. Academic research published in Nature Aging with David Sinclair and Martin Ellison grounds this macro-economic framing in the science of ageing itself – connecting what medical advances mean for labour supply to decisions boards face today. Scott advises the UK Office for Budget Responsibility and has previously advised HM Treasury and the Bank of England. He co-founded The Longevity Forum and serves on the World Economic Forum’s Global Future Council on Healthy Ageing and Longevity. In 2026, he was appointed CBE for services to economics, research and public discourse. Key speaking topics Economics of longevity Demographic change and long-term economic growth Multigenerational workforce design Career reinvention and the 50-year working life Health, ageing, and the economics of prevention Fiscal sustainability and pension system reform AI, technology, and demographic change Business strategy and long-run demographic risk Ideal for CHROs and heads of people strategy at large, multigenerational organisations navigating career architecture and workforce planning for longer working lives Boards and senior leadership teams integrating demographic risk into long-term strategy alongside AI and geopolitical disruption Financial services leaders – asset managers, pension funds, insurers – whose business models are directly shaped by the structural economics of ageing populations Policymakers and public sector leaders with responsibility for labour market, health, or fiscal policy Audience outcomes A concrete framework – the ageing society vs longevity society distinction – for identifying where current workforce and business strategies are misaligned with demographic reality Clarity on the three-dimensional longevity dividend: what it means in practice to build for lives that are longer, healthier, and economically productive Specific implications for pension design, benefit frameworks, talent investment, and career architecture – not trend-watching, but decision-relevant analysis An evidence-based view of how advances in geroscience and health technology are likely to affect labour supply and workforce composition over the next two decades A new strategic vocabulary for the board conversation on longevity – one that moves from “ageing burden” to a concrete set of opportunities and organisational decisions

Why organisations work with Carl Honoré He makes a specific, testable claim that most management culture resists: that slowing down is not a productivity concession but a competitive advantage, and he has two decades of cross-sector evidence to support it. His Slow Fix framework gives organisations a direct alternative to short-termism in problem-solving, not as a philosophical preference, but as a structured approach to decisions that actually hold. On ageing and the workforce, he converts a topic most organisations treat as a compliance or HR issue into a commercial argument: mixed-age teams outperform across measurable metrics, and ageism is a business risk, not just a social one. His work sits at the junction of two urgent organisational pressures – sustainable performance culture and the longevity economy – giving him a rare dual relevance for leadership teams and people functions simultaneously. As the originator of the Slow Movement – a framework covered by the Financial Times, Wall Street Journal, Economist and Time, among others – he brings a level of intellectual ownership that very few speakers in the workplace culture space can claim. Biography highlights Author of In Praise of Slow (2004), Under Pressure, The Slow Fix, and Bolder – published in 36 languages, with bestseller listings across multiple countries Two main-stage TED Talks – “In Praise of Slowness” and “Why We Should Embrace Aging as an Adventure” – with combined views in the millions In Praise of Slow described by the Financial Times as the foundational text of the Slow Movement Journalist whose work has appeared in The Economist, Observer, National Post, Houston Chronicle, Miami Herald, and Time Named 2024 Advocate for Aging by Next Avenue and the American Society on Aging Creator and presenter of BBC Radio 4 series Status by Carl Honoré; previously presented The Slow Coach for BBC Radio 4 and Frantic Family Rescue for ABC TV Australia Bolder selected as BBC Radio 4 Book of the Week and Reader’s Digest (UK) Book of the Month Graduated from the University of Edinburgh; reported across Europe and South America for over a decade before turning to books Biography Speed and youth are the two defaults of modern organisational culture. Carl Honoré has built a career and a global movement on the argument that both are miscalibrated, and that the evidence for changing them is stronger than most organisations acknowledge. In Praise of Slow (2004), the book that gave the Slow Movement its name and its intellectual framework, made a counterintuitive claim: that choosing when to be fast, rather than defaulting to fast, is a more reliable route to performance. The Financial Times placed it as the foundational text of the movement. His third book, The Slow Fix, extended that argument into problem-solving, building the case that organisations addicted to quick responses consistently underperform against those willing to invest time in diagnosis and depth. His more recent work, anchored in Bolder, applies the same analytical lens to age. The demographic case for rethinking older workers is well-established in research; the cultural and commercial case is Honoré’s contribution. His argument that ageism functions as a form of the same bias toward speed and novelty that distorts organisational decision-making, connects the two strands of his work into a coherent framework for leaders. In 2024, that work was recognised by both Next Avenue and the American Society on Aging, who named him an Advocate for Aging. Trained as a journalist at The Economist, Observer, and Time, among other outlets, Honoré brings a mode of inquiry to organisational topics that is grounded in evidence gathered across cultures and sectors, not in a single industry or institutional context. His two main-stage TED Talks have been viewed millions of times; his books are published in 36 languages. Key speaking topics Pace as organisational strategy The Slow Movement and workplace performance Multigenerational workforce design Ageism as a commercial risk Sustainable performance and decision quality The Slow Fix: problem-solving under pressure Status, hierarchy, and organisational culture Longevity and the future of work Ideal for CHROs and people leaders designing age-inclusive workforces and addressing talent retention across generations CEOs and senior leadership teams examining whether performance culture is undermining the quality of decisions and the depth of problem-solving Boards and executive committees navigating the commercial implications of ageing demographics and multigenerational customer bases Culture transformation leads and change management functions rethinking pace, productivity, and sustainable output Audience outcomes A clear framework for diagnosing where organisational speed becomes a liability – in decision-making, leadership, and creative work Evidence-based understanding of why multigenerational teams outperform and what structural changes enable that performance A reframed view of ageism as a commercial and strategic problem, not only a social or legal one Practical approaches drawn from the Slow Fix framework for tackling complex problems without defaulting to short-term solutions Greater awareness of the connection between pace culture and youth bias – and why addressing one typically requires addressing both

Why organisations work with Catherine Mayer She has reported on power at the most senior editorial level, as Europe Editor and Editor at Large of TIME, and then tried to rebuild it, by founding a national political party. Few speakers on inclusion have done both. Her book Attack of the Fifty Foot Women reframes gender equality as an economic and institutional argument, not a values statement, which makes it usable in a boardroom conversation about strategy and risk. She can talk about royal institutions, political parties and global newsrooms from the inside, which gives senior audiences a sharper read on how hierarchical organisations actually work. Her writing on ageing (Amortality) and grief (Good Grief) gives her authority on two subjects most workplaces handle badly: longer working lives and bereavement in the workforce. She is a working journalist by training, which shows in the room. Arguments are specific, sourced and willing to be challenged. Biography highlights Senior editor at TIME magazine from 2004 to 2015, serving as London Bureau Chief, Europe Editor and Editor at Large. Co-founder, with Sandi Toksvig, of the UK Women’s Equality Party in March 2015, and its President. Author of Attack of the Fifty Foot Women, Amortality, Charles: The Heart of a King and Good Grief. Winner of the Foreign Press Association «Story of the Year» award, 2010, and shortlisted for the Orwell Prize, 2011. Co-founder of the Primadonna Festival of ideas, writing and music, and advisory board member of NOON. Former President of the Foreign Press Association in London, 2003 to 2005; began her career at The Economist. Biography Gender equality inside large institutions has become a paradox. Reports, networks and policies have multiplied, yet the shape of senior power has moved far less than the paperwork suggests. Catherine Mayer has spent her career watching this pattern from two very different sides. For more than a decade at TIME magazine, she reported on presidents, prime ministers and royal courts as Europe Editor and Editor at Large, with her 2010 cover story on David Cameron’s first US visit winning the Foreign Press Association «Story of the Year» and her writing shortlisted for the Orwell Prize in 2011. Her biography Charles: The Heart of a King drew on years of access to the British royal household and generated international headlines for what it revealed about how closed institutions actually operate. In March 2015, with Sandi Toksvig, she co-founded the Women’s Equality Party and served as its President until the party was dissolved in 2024. Attack of the Fifty Foot Women grew out of that work and argues, in hard economic and political terms, that closing the gender gap is the single largest lever available to most societies. Amortality examines the other structural story reshaping workplaces: longer lives and the collapse of age-based expectations about careers. Good Grief, written with her mother Anne Mayer Bird after they were widowed within 41 days of each other at the start of the pandemic, has made her one of the more candid public voices on bereavement at work. She co-founded the Primadonna Festival in Suffolk in 2019 and sits on the advisory board of NOON. Senior teams book her when they want an argument about institutional change that has been tested against real media, real politics and real loss. Key speaking topics Gender equality as institutional and economic strategy Power, hierarchy and how closed institutions operate Media, journalism and political accountability Ageing, longevity and the multigenerational workforce Grief and bereavement in the workplace Founding and running a new political organisation Culture change inside legacy organisations Ideal for Executive teams and boards reviewing gender, inclusion and cultural change strategy CHROs and Chief People Officers looking beyond policy to institutional redesign Leadership conferences on media, politics and public trust Employee network summits and international women’s events with a senior audience Audience outcomes A sharper account of why most inclusion programmes stall, drawn from politics, media and royal institutions, not consultancy theory An economic and institutional case for gender equality that a CFO or board member can use A clearer view of how longer lives and multigenerational workforces change talent strategy Usable language for how organisations should talk to staff about grief and bereavement A journalist’s scepticism about the difference between corporate announcement and actual structural change

Why organisations work with Chip Conley He turned a single boutique hotel into a 50-property group as CEO of Joie de Vivre, then mentored Brian Chesky through Airbnb’s hospitality build-out. Few speakers can speak from inside both an independent operator and a category-defining platform. His Modern Elder thesis gives leadership teams a usable language for intergenerational collaboration at a moment when most companies are still treating age as a liability rather than a capability. He applied Maslow’s hierarchy of needs to corporate strategy in his book Peak and his 2010 TED talk, and the framework still reads as one of the more durable arguments for measuring culture, employee engagement, and customer experience as connected variables. The Modern Elder Academy he founded in 2018 is the only midlife wisdom school running at scale, with over 2,000 alumni and a second campus, which gives him real operating data on how mid-career professionals reset, retrain, and re-enter organisations. He is a New York Times bestselling author and three-time TED speaker, with books published across two decades that track the same throughline: human meaning as the underlying engine of commercial performance. Biography highlights Founder and former CEO of Joie de Vivre Hospitality, which he built from a single property in 1987 into a portfolio of around 50 boutique hotels. Former Head of Global Hospitality and Strategy at Airbnb, mentor to CEO Brian Chesky during the company’s expansion to hosts in 191 countries. Founder and Executive Chairman of Modern Elder Academy, with campuses in Baja California Sur and Santa Fe and more than 2,000 alumni. Three-time TED speaker, including “Measuring what makes life worthwhile” (2010) and his 2023 talk on the midlife chrysalis. New York Times bestselling author of Wisdom@Work: The Making of a Modern Elder and Learning to Love Midlife: 12 Reasons Why Life Gets Better with Age, alongside Peak, Emotional Equations, The Rebel Rules, and Marketing That Matters. Stanford BA and MBA. Named Most Innovative CEO in the Bay Area by San Francisco Business Times and recipient of the hospitality industry’s 2012 Pioneer Award. Biography The conventional career arc treats age as a depreciation curve. Chip Conley has spent two decades arguing the opposite, and building the institutions to prove it. He founded Joie de Vivre Hospitality in San Francisco in 1987, ran it for nearly 24 years, and grew it into one of California’s largest boutique hotel groups, around 50 properties at its peak. The book that came out of that period, Peak: How Great Companies Get Their Mojo from Maslow, applied Abraham Maslow’s hierarchy of needs to employee, customer, and investor relationships, and remains the most cited articulation of his commercial argument that human meaning is the engine, not the decoration, of business performance. In 2013, Airbnb’s three founders asked him to become Head of Global Hospitality and Strategy. He mentored Brian Chesky and helped translate a tech platform into a hospitality company operating with hosts in 191 countries. The label he picked up there, “modern elder”, became the seed of his next institution. The Modern Elder Academy, which he founded in 2018, has campuses in Baja California Sur and Santa Fe and has now run more than 2,000 mid-career professionals through structured programmes on transition, longevity, and the social contract between generations at work. His more recent books, Wisdom@Work and Learning to Love Midlife, push that thesis into the corporate agenda directly: age as a category of workforce diversity, midlife as a strategic asset, and the intergenerational team as a more accurate model of how organisations actually learn. The argument is grounded in operating experience, not commentary, which is why boards and executive teams increasingly book him to challenge the assumptions inside their own talent strategy. Key speaking topics The multigenerational workplace and the case for age as workforce diversity Modern Elder leadership and the redesign of mid-career Culture and employee engagement built on Maslow’s hierarchy of needs Disruptive innovation in hospitality and platform businesses Customer experience as a function of internal culture Emotional intelligence in leadership Midlife transition, longevity, and workforce retention Ideal for CHROs and chief people officers redesigning talent strategy across five generations at work CEOs and boards facing attrition of senior expertise and weak intergenerational knowledge transfer Hospitality, travel, and consumer-facing leadership teams rebuilding culture as a commercial asset Executive development and leadership academy programmes focused on mid-career renewal and senior transition Audience outcomes A clearer operating definition of intergenerational collaboration, with concrete language for treating age as a diversity and capability question A reframed view of mid-career and senior employees as a strategic asset rather than a cost line A working model, drawn from Peak and Maslow, for connecting employee meaning, customer experience, and financial performance Specific, named examples from Joie de Vivre, Airbnb, and Modern Elder Academy that translate into practical policy and culture changes A more honest conversation inside the leadership team about ageism, longevity, and what wisdom is actually worth in commercial terms

Why organisations work with Clover Hogan She turns climate anxiety from a cultural backdrop into a measurable pressure point on recruitment, retention, and stakeholder trust, with specific evidence from Force of Nature’s work with young people in more than fifty countries. She has moved between youth movements and Fortune 50 boardrooms, including PepsiCo and Unilever, which means she can translate Gen Z expectations into language a sustainability committee can act on. Her TED talk “What to do when climate change feels unstoppable” has been viewed close to two million times, giving her a rare ability to hold a mixed audience, including sceptics, on a subject most speakers polarise. She founded Force of Nature at nineteen and built it into an internationally recognised organisation before handing over leadership, which gives her direct operating experience of building a climate programme rather than only commenting on one. Forbes 30 Under 30 listing and features in the Financial Times, The Guardian, BBC, The New York Times, National Geographic, and Vogue place her in the small group of climate voices that board-level audiences already know by name. Biography highlights Founder of Force of Nature, a youth non-profit mobilising mindsets for climate action, founded at age nineteen. Former Executive Director of Force of Nature; now advisor and chair of the board after a formal leadership handover in 2024. TED speaker, “What to do when climate change feels unstoppable,” with close to two million views. Recognised on the Forbes 30 Under 30 list at age twenty-two. Host of the Force of Nature podcast, in conversation with figures including lawyers behind landmark climate agreements and Nobel Peace Prize nominees. Has advised Fortune 50 companies including PepsiCo and Unilever on Gen Z climate expectations; interviewed the 14th Dalai Lama and shared platforms with Jane Goodall and Vandana Shiva. Featured in the Financial Times, The Guardian, BBC, The New York Times, National Geographic, and Vogue. Biography The climate conversation inside most large organisations has quietly shifted. It used to be a reporting question. It is now a hiring question, a customer question, and a boardroom legitimacy question. Force of Nature, the non-profit Clover Hogan founded at nineteen, has spent the last several years mapping that shift from the other side of the table, working with young people in more than fifty countries on what they actually expect from the companies they join, buy from, and vote with. Hogan treats eco-anxiety as a serious operating variable, not a feeling. Her TED talk, “What to do when climate change feels unstoppable,” has reached close to two million viewers by refusing both doom and false optimism, and by naming what people are actually experiencing. Inside Fortune 50 boardrooms, including PepsiCo and Unilever, she translates that same research into a direct question for leadership teams: what are you asking your people to defend, and can you defend it yourself. Her authority comes from operating experience. She built Force of Nature into an internationally recognised youth organisation, managed a formal handover to new leadership in 2024, and now sits as chair of the board while advising organisations and speaking internationally. The Force of Nature podcast has put her in extended conversation with figures ranging from Nobel Peace Prize nominees to the lawyers behind landmark climate agreements, and with Jane Goodall, Vandana Shiva, and the 14th Dalai Lama. The effect in a room of senior leaders is specific. She will not make the climate crisis smaller than it is, and she will not let it become an abstraction. She returns the conversation to the concrete group of people, inside and outside the organisation, whose trust the next decade of climate strategy has to earn. Key speaking topics Climate leadership and corporate accountability Eco-anxiety and climate psychology Gen Z expectations of employers and brands Youth engagement and movement building ESG credibility and the gap between commitments and delivery Storytelling and public communication on the climate crisis Purpose and values in modern organisations Ideal for Chief Sustainability Officers and ESG leads defending or rebuilding climate strategy against tougher stakeholder scrutiny. CHROs and talent leaders whose recruitment and retention now runs through how credible the organisation looks on climate. Boards and executive committees setting the next phase of sustainability commitments and the communications around them. Brand, marketing, and corporate affairs leaders whose audiences are increasingly Gen Z and increasingly unforgiving of gaps between claim and practice. Audience outcomes A sharper read on what younger employees and consumers are actually asking of organisations on climate, beyond the survey headlines. Language for discussing eco-anxiety as a workforce and stakeholder factor rather than a private sentiment. A more honest internal test for where the organisation’s climate commitments are holding up and where they are exposed. Confidence to lead climate conversations with staff, customers, and boards without retreating into either doom or marketing gloss. A clearer sense of how youth movements, media scrutiny, and investor pressure are converging into a single reputational frontier.

Why organisations work with Csaba Toth He runs ICQ Global, a people development business with more than 200 licensed partners across 45-plus countries, which means his methods have been pressure-tested in genuinely multicultural settings rather than theorised in one market. The Global DISC model is ICF and CPD-accredited and gives leaders one common language for personality, generation, profession, and nationality differences inside the same team. He measures and benchmarks psychological safety, motivational drivers, and cognitive diversity, so the conversation moves from cultural awareness slogans to specific data leaders can act on. His credential stack is unusually substantive: John Mattone Intelligent Leadership coach, Hofstede Insights Associate Partner, Richard Lewis-certified behavioural consultant, three Master’s degrees and an Executive MBA. He co-authored Uncommon Sense in Unusual Times with contributions from Marshall Goldsmith and John Mattone, a credibility marker for senior HR and L&D buyers familiar with that lineage. Biography highlights Founder of ICQ Global, a people development organisation with over 200 licensed partners across more than 45 countries. Developer of the Global DISC model, an ICF and CPD Standards-accredited intercultural behavioural framework. Author of Uncommon Sense in Unusual Times, with contributions from Marshall Goldsmith and John Mattone. Forbes Coaches Council member and Harvard Business Review Advisory Council member. Hofstede Insights Associate Partner and Richard Lewis Communications-certified cross-cultural trainer. Holds three Master’s degrees (Italy, UK, Hungary) and an Executive MBA from Quantic School of Business and Technology. Biography Diversity strategies fail at the level of daily team interaction. People with different nationalities, professions, generations, and personalities sit in the same meeting, draw different conclusions from the same words, and lose trust in each other long before anyone names the problem. That is the gap Csaba Toth set out to close. He founded ICQ Global to make cognitive and cultural diversity measurable. The company now operates with more than 200 licensed partners across 45-plus countries, and its core asset is the Global DISC model, an ICF and CPD-accredited framework that extends the most widely used behavioural model in business with a layer for cultural intelligence. Leaders get a single language for the differences that actually slow teams down. The credentials behind the work are unusually deep. Toth is certified through John Mattone’s Intelligent Leadership programme, holds Human Synergistics accreditation, is a Hofstede Insights Associate Partner and a Richard Lewis Communications-certified behavioural consultant, with further certification in CBT, NLP, and Positive Intelligence. He sits on the Forbes Coaches Council and the Harvard Business Review Advisory Council, holds three Master’s degrees from Italy, the UK and Hungary, and an Executive MBA from Quantic School of Business and Technology. His book, Uncommon Sense in Unusual Times, published with contributions from Marshall Goldsmith and John Mattone, sets out how leaders stay relevant when the people around them increasingly do not think, decide, or communicate the same way they do. That is the practical question he answers in a room. Key speaking topics Cultural intelligence and the Global DISC model Psychological safety in multicultural teams Cognitive diversity and team performance Inclusive leadership across generations and nationalities Communication breakdown in global organisations Motivational drivers and behavioural difference Coaching and people development at scale Ideal for CHROs, Heads of L&D, and Heads of Talent leading global or multicultural workforces. DEI and Inclusion leads moving past awareness work into measurable team outcomes. Leadership development and coaching faculties inside multinational businesses. Senior leaders of cross-border teams where communication and trust have stalled. Audience outcomes A common vocabulary for cultural, generational, and personality differences that a team can use the next day. A clearer read on where psychological safety is breaking down inside their own teams and why. The Global DISC lens applied to a real internal dynamic the audience already recognises. Specific behavioural shifts leaders can make when working across cultures, professions, and generations. A more honest assessment of how cognitive diversity is helping or hurting performance in their organisation.

Why organisations work with Dan Pontefract The Work-Life Bloom model is not a concept – it is a research-backed framework with 12 named factors, four defined employee personas, and a structured approach that leaders can apply to their teams immediately. It gives organisations something specific to replace the work-life balance language they already know is not working. His decade as Chief Envisioner and Chief Learning Officer at TELUS – where he launched the TELUS MBA, the Transformation Office, and a leadership philosophy that drove employee engagement to nearly 90% – means he is not theorising about culture change from the outside. He has built it at scale. His five award-winning books each address a discrete organisational tension with a named model: the three-level purpose sweet spot (The Purpose Effect), the cyclical Open Thinking framework (Open to Think), the nine-lesson caring leadership model (Lead. Care. Win.), and the 12-factor Work-Life Bloom. Audiences leave with named frameworks they can act on, not just ideas they can reflect on. His sixth book, The Future of Work Is Grey (May 2026), positions him on a strategic workforce issue that most boards are not yet treating as a risk: age debt – the growing talent and productivity shortfall created by demographic ageing – and the experience dividend available to organisations that treat older workers as assets. He is one of the few leadership voices in this space with a complete framework already developed. Thinkers50 Radar recognition (Class of 2018) and the Thinkers50 Best New Management Book designation for Work-Life Bloom (2024) provide intellectual validation beyond the speaking circuit. His ideas are credentialed within the management thinking community, not only the keynote market. Biography highlights Founder and CEO, Pontefract Group; former Chief Envisioner and Chief Learning Officer, TELUS Author of five award-winning books: Flat Army, The Purpose Effect, Open to Think, Lead. Care. Win., and Work-Life Bloom; sixth book, The Future of Work Is Grey, publishing May 2026 Work-Life Bloom: 2024 Thinkers50 Best New Management Book and Axiom Business Book Awards Gold Medal, Leadership category Open to Think: 2019 getAbstract International Book of the Year; Lead. Care. Win.: 2022 Nautilus Awards Silver Medal for Leadership Thinkers50 Radar Class of 2018; shortlisted, Thinkers50 Talent Award, 2019 Adjunct Professor, Gustavson School of Business, University of Victoria Contributor to Forbes and Harvard Business Review Presented at four TED events; delivered more than 1,000 keynotes across North America, Europe, Australia, and the Middle East Biography Work-life balance has been the default language of organisational culture for three decades. The data says it is not working. Engagement has flatlined, burnout has become a structural feature of corporate life, and the gap between what leaders promise their people and what they actually deliver keeps widening. The framework itself is the problem. Dan Pontefract has spent two decades inside and alongside organisations asking why the standard tools keep failing. His Work-Life Bloom model, built on primary research with more than 8,000 leaders and team members across 15 countries, maps 12 factors that determine whether people can genuinely flourish in both work and life. The insight spans five award-winning books and gives leaders a practical operating system to act on, not just a new way of describing the problem. That credibility is not theoretical. As Chief Envisioner and Chief Learning Officer at TELUS, Pontefract launched the TELUS MBA, the company’s Transformation Office, and a leadership philosophy that drove employee engagement to nearly 90%. Since founding Pontefract Group in 2018, he has worked with organisations including Salesforce, Nestlé, Manulife, and Virgin Media O2. His sixth book, The Future of Work Is Grey, publishing May 2026, tackles a challenge most boards have not yet named. As populations age and birth rates fall, organisations are accumulating what he calls age debt – a growing talent and productivity shortfall they are unprepared for. His Rivers, Rocks, and Rubies framework gives leaders a practical approach to treating experience as a competitive asset. He is an adjunct professor at the University of Victoria’s Gustavson School of Business and a contributor to Forbes and Harvard Business Review. Thinkers50 named him to the Radar Class of 2018. Key speaking topics Work-life bloom and the conditions for employee flourishing Culture transformation and employee engagement Purpose-driven leadership Caring and human-centred leadership practice The multigenerational workforce and age as a strategic asset Open thinking, decision-making, and organisational performance The future of work Ideal for CHROs and People and Culture leaders redesigning engagement, wellbeing, and culture strategy CEOs and senior leadership teams navigating cultural transformation or significant workforce change Transformation leads and Learning and Development heads building leadership capability at scale Executive teams and boards confronting multigenerational workforce planning and the talent implications of demographic ageing Audience outcomes A named, practical alternative to work-life balance – the Work-Life Bloom model and its 12 factors – that leaders can apply to their teams immediately after the session Clarity on the four work-life personas (blooming, budding, stunted, in renewal) and how to identify and respond to each within their own organisations A framework for three-level purpose alignment – between individual, role, and organisation – drawn from The Purpose Effect model Nine concrete leadership practices from the Lead. Care. Win. model for building caring, high-trust teams in everyday conditions An initial strategic lens on the multigenerational workforce challenge and the actions leaders should be prioritising now

Why organisations work with Dr. Diane Hamilton She turns curiosity from a soft cultural aspiration into a measurable diagnostic. The Curiosity Code Index gives leaders a named set of inhibitors, fear, assumptions, technology, environment, that can be addressed with specific interventions rather than slogans. Her work connects directly to the business outcomes leaders are already accountable for: engagement, innovation rate, learning velocity, retention. The framing makes curiosity legible to a CFO, not only to an L&D team. Thinkers50 Radar selection (2020) places her among a small group of behavioural thinkers being actively translated into corporate practice. The recognition signals her credibility to boards reviewing speaker rosters. A Forbes column and five years interviewing thousands of senior leaders on her nationally syndicated radio show mean she walks into a boardroom already fluent in the language of the C-suite. Four decades of business experience, an MBA program chair role, and certifications in Myers-Briggs and EQ-i give her the assessment vocabulary HR leaders trust, without the academic distance that limits some behavioural speakers. Biography highlights Founder and CEO of Tonerra, a management consulting and training business focused on curiosity, perception, and behavioural assessment. Creator of the Curiosity Code Index and the Perception Power Index, both validated organisational assessments with associated certification programmes. Thinkers50 Radar 2020 selection, the annual list of management thinkers most likely to influence organisational practice. Fulbright Specialist and faculty member at Duke Corporate Education, the executive education arm of Duke University, and former MBA Program Chair at the Forbes School of Business and Technology. Author of Cracking the Curiosity Code, Curiosity Unleashed, and The Power of Perception (with Dr. Maja Zelihic), with a fourth title, Adaptive Curiosity, forthcoming from Wiley. Host of Take the Lead, a nationally syndicated radio show, where she interviewed thousands of senior leaders including Steve Forbes, Naveen Jain, and Craig Newmark. Forbes contributor on workplace behaviour, leadership, and innovation. Biography Curiosity is one of the most cited drivers of organisational performance and one of the least precisely measured. Diane Hamilton built her career on closing that gap. The Curiosity Code Index, which she created and validated, identifies the four factors that suppress curiosity inside organisations: fear, assumptions, technology, and environment. The framework, known as FATE, gives leaders a diagnostic rather than a slogan. Hamilton brings the assessment vocabulary HR functions trust. She holds a PhD in business management and is a certified Myers-Briggs and EQ-i practitioner. She teaches leadership as faculty at Duke Corporate Education and previously chaired the MBA programme at the Forbes School of Business and Technology. Her consulting firm, Tonerra, applies the Curiosity Code Index alongside the Perception Power Index, a second validated instrument she developed with Dr. Maja Zelihic and set out in their book The Power of Perception. Thinkers50 named her to its 2020 Radar, the annual cohort of management thinkers shaping organisational practice. She writes for Forbes on workplace behaviour. Over five years hosting Take the Lead, her nationally syndicated radio show, she interviewed thousands of senior figures, including Steve Forbes and Craig Newmark. As a Fulbright Specialist she speaks and teaches internationally, with recent engagements in the United States, Luxembourg, and Dubai. For a corporate audience, the practical value is the move from cultural rhetoric to behavioural intervention. Hamilton names the specific structures and assumptions that suppress curiosity inside a given organisation, then prescribes the changes that follow. Her forthcoming book, Adaptive Curiosity, extends that work to the question now facing every leadership team: what stays distinctly valuable in people as intelligent machines absorb more of the work. Key speaking topics Curiosity as an organisational capability Perception and global leadership Emotional intelligence in senior roles Future-proofing the workforce in the age of AI Innovation culture and employee engagement Behavioural assessment in leadership development Multigenerational workforce dynamics Ideal for CHROs and senior HR leaders rebuilding engagement and learning culture Heads of L&D commissioning behavioural assessment programmes Innovation and transformation leads diagnosing why initiatives stall Executive teams investing in EQ and behavioural development for senior cohorts Audience outcomes A named diagnostic, FATE, for identifying what specifically suppresses curiosity in their organisation A framework for connecting curiosity to engagement, innovation, and retention metrics leaders already track Tools to assess and develop emotional intelligence and perception in senior teams A clearer view of how personality and generational differences shape team performance A practical sense of which behavioural interventions move the needle and which produce activity without change