Political Risk & Policy

Key speaking topics Walkable city planning Urban design and street design Downtown revitalisation New Urbanism Smart growth Public realm and placemaking Transportation and city planning Ideal for City and regional leaders Urban planners and transport authorities Real estate and development professionals Corporate leaders involved in place-based investment Audience outcomes Clear understanding of the principles of walkable city design Insight into practical approaches to downtown revitalisation Frameworks for improving street design and public space Greater clarity on the economic and social value of walkability Why organisations work with Jeff Speck Combines public sector leadership experience with private consultancy practice. Brings published frameworks that have influenced urban planning debates. Offers practical, policy-relevant insight for cities and organisations shaping the built environment. Aligns design thinking with economic vitality and community outcomes. Biography Jeff Speck is a city planner and urban designer whose work focuses on helping cities and organisations create walkable, economically resilient communities. As a founding partner of Speck Dempsey, he advises public- and private-sector clients on urban planning, street design, and downtown revitalisation strategies that strengthen long-term value. His career combines national policy leadership with hands-on planning expertise. As former Director of Design at the US National Endowment for the Arts, he led design-related grantmaking and worked with initiatives including the Mayors’ Institute on City Design and the Governors’ Institute on Community Design, supporting civic leaders in shaping the built environment. Earlier, he spent roughly a decade at Duany Plater-Zyberk & Co., where he became Director of Town Planning and contributed to the development and application of New Urbanist principles in practice. Jeff is the author of Walkable City and Walkable City Rules, and co-author of Suburban Nation and The Smart Growth Manual. His books are widely read within planning and design communities, and Walkable City has been translated into multiple languages, shaping debate around transportation, development, and the future of urban centres. He has delivered widely viewed public talks, including TED appearances, on walkability and urban design, and is a recipient of the Seaside Prize in recognition of his contribution to the field.

Why organisations work with Yuval Noah Harari The NEXUS framework – which distinguishes self-correcting from self-reinforcing information networks – gives boards and governance teams a precise conceptual tool for evaluating AI strategy and regulatory exposure, grounded in historical evidence rather than prediction. Sapiens introduced the argument that large-scale human cooperation is built on shared fictions. For leadership teams, this reframes how institutions, legal systems, and monetary frameworks actually hold power – and what causes them to fail. Direct conversations with heads of state including Macron, Merkel, and Rutte put his arguments at the level of active geopolitical decision-making, not commentary. Audiences engage with someone whose thinking is tested at the highest levels of governance. His Distinguished Research Fellowship at Cambridge’s Centre for the Study of Existential Risk anchors his arguments on AI in active institutional research on civilisational-scale risk – not opinion or futurism. The 100,000-year historical lens is genuinely rare in this space. It gives senior audiences a method for distinguishing structurally permanent change from cyclical volatility – applicable immediately to strategy, regulation, and organisational design. Biography highlights Professor of History, Department of History, Hebrew University of Jerusalem; PhD from the University of Oxford, 2002 Author of Sapiens, Homo Deus, 21 Lessons for the 21st Century, and NEXUS – published in more than 65 languages; Sapiens held the Sunday Times bestseller top three for 96 consecutive weeks and ranked #10 in the NYT’s 100 Best Books of the 21st Century (2024) Distinguished Research Fellow, Centre for the Study of Existential Risk, University of Cambridge Two-time Polonsky Prize for Creativity and Originality (2009, 2012); Moncado Award, Society for Military History (2011); Handelsblatt German Economic Book Award for Homo Deus (2017) WEF Davos keynote speaker in 2016, 2018, 2020, and 2026; CBS 60 Minutes profile (2021) Regular contributor to the Financial Times, The Guardian, The Economist, New York Times, and Nature Biography Organisations making decisions about AI governance are operating without historical context. The scale of information networks has changed before – with writing, printing, and broadcasting – and power has reorganised around each transition. What makes AI structurally different is not its speed or scale, but the fact that, for the first time, the network itself can generate and act on information without human instruction. Yuval Noah Harari is a Professor of History at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and a Distinguished Research Fellow at Cambridge’s Centre for the Study of Existential Risk. His four major works – Sapiens, Homo Deus, 21 Lessons for the 21st Century, and NEXUS – form a sustained argument about the relationship between information, power, and human agency, tracing it from the deep past to the governance decisions of the AI era. NEXUS, published in 2024, made that argument most directly relevant to organisations. Harari’s central distinction – between information systems that are self-correcting and those that reinforce existing power – gives leaders a practical framework for evaluating AI governance, regulatory exposure, and institutional design. The book argues that how organisations and governments navigate this distinction is the defining question of the current period. NEXUS reached number two on both the New York Times and Sunday Times bestseller lists within a week of publication. Harari has held public conversations with heads of state including Emmanuel Macron, Angela Merkel, and Mark Rutte on the future of AI and information. He has delivered keynote addresses at the World Economic Forum in Davos in 2016, 2018, 2020, and 2026, and contributes regularly to the Financial Times, The Guardian, The Economist, and Nature. His books have been translated into more than 65 languages. Key speaking topics Artificial intelligence and information governance The history and future of information networks Geopolitical risk and global power Long-term civilisational change and strategic foresight Human agency and technological disruption Shared fictions, institutions, and how societies hold together AI regulation and democratic resilience Ideal for Boards and C-suite leadership teams navigating AI governance, information strategy, or long-term geopolitical risk Policy, government affairs, and strategic foresight functions at senior level Global conference and forum audiences at CEO, minister, or board director level Technology strategy and corporate affairs teams working on the societal and regulatory implications of AI Audience outcomes A macro-historical framework for reading which changes are structurally significant vs cyclical – applicable to strategy, governance, and regulatory positioning Practical understanding of the NEXUS distinction between self-correcting and self-reinforcing information systems, and its implications for AI governance design Clearer thinking about where power resides in information networks, and what that means for institutional and organisational decisions Historical context for positioning AI decisions within the longer pattern of how information technologies have redistributed political and economic power Sharper questions to bring back to leadership, board, and regulatory conversations already underway

Why organisations work with Josef Joffe Four decades inside the engine room of European opinion-shaping as publisher-editor of Die Zeit and columnist for Suddeutsche Zeitung, giving boards a primary source on how Berlin, Paris and Brussels actually think. A contrarian intellectual record on American power. The Myth of America’s Decline (Liveright, 2013) dismantled the standard declinist consensus and predicted China’s strategic limits years before they became conventional wisdom. Co-founder of The American Interest with Brzezinski, Cohen and Fukuyama, and of its successor American Purpose. He has shaped the most serious post-Cold War conversation on the West’s strategic future. Stanford Hoover and Freeman Spogli affiliations alongside teaching at Harvard, Johns Hopkins SAIS and Stanford. Boards get an academic seriousness uncommon among geopolitical commentators. Bilingual fluency in the German and American political mind. He is one of the few public intellectuals who can address a transatlantic audience without translating awkwardly between the two political cultures. Biography highlights Publisher-editor of Die Zeit, 2000 to 2023, after fifteen years as editorial page editor of Suddeutsche Zeitung. Distinguished Visiting Fellow at the Hoover Institution and courtesy professor of political science at Stanford; Senior Fellow of Stanford’s Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies. PhD in Government from Harvard; MA from Johns Hopkins SAIS; BA from Swarthmore. Author of The Myth of America’s Decline (2013), Uberpower: The Imperial Temptation of America (2007) and The Limited Partnership (1987). Co-founder of The American Interest (2005) and American Purpose (2020), with Brzezinski, Cohen and Fukuyama. Recipient of the Theodor Wolff Prize, the Ludwig Borne Prize and Germany’s Federal Order of Merit. Biography The post-1945 international order is being rewritten in real time. War has returned to Europe, the China-US contest has hardened, and Germany has begun a defence and energy reorientation that would have been unthinkable a decade ago. Reading these shifts is now part of board-level strategic work, not foreign policy commentary. Josef Joffe has been working this territory for forty years. As publisher-editor of Die Zeit from 2000 to 2023, and before that as editorial page editor of Suddeutsche Zeitung, he shaped how the German political class understood its place in the Atlantic alliance. His books, including The Myth of America’s Decline (Liveright, 2013) and Uberpower: The Imperial Temptation of America (W.W. Norton, 2007), argue against the prevailing declinist reading of US power, drawing on demographic, economic and military fundamentals that he was naming well before they became consensus. At Stanford he is a Distinguished Visiting Fellow at the Hoover Institution, courtesy professor of political science, and Senior Fellow of the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies. He took his PhD in Government from Harvard and has taught at Harvard, Johns Hopkins SAIS and Stanford. In 2005 he co-founded The American Interest with Zbigniew Brzezinski, Eliot Cohen and Francis Fukuyama; in 2020 the successor publication American Purpose. What Joffe offers leadership teams is rare. A working bilingual command of the German and American political minds, an analytical record that has been right on the durability of American power, and the willingness to make a contrarian argument in front of a room that expects the conventional one. Key speaking topics US foreign policy and the future of American power Transatlantic relations and the Atlantic alliance Germany and the European political order China, Russia and the great-power contest The Middle East and Israel The fracturing post-1945 international order Ideal for Boards and executive committees with material exposure to US-China decoupling, Russia sanctions or European political risk CEOs and strategy leaders of transatlantic firms briefing their leadership on geopolitical scenarios CFOs and treasurers making capital allocation decisions against macro-political volatility Investor and partner forums where senior audiences expect serious foreign-policy analysis rather than commentary Audience outcomes A clearer reading of where US power, the China contest and European politics are actually heading, against the prevailing headlines A frame for distinguishing structural shifts from cyclical noise in transatlantic politics Direct insight into how Berlin, Paris and Brussels are recalibrating after the war in Ukraine A contrarian’s stress test of the assumptions their organisation is currently working from on geopolitics

Why organisations work with Miloš Maričić He gives investment boards a working diagnostic for distinguishing real machine learning from AI marketing, anchored in his SPEC framework and his CFA Institute Enterprising Investor work on weak quant models. He chairs Executive AI, the network of CEOs of major European institutional investment organisations, and represented that industry in the EU Artificial Intelligence Act standardisation process. Few speakers can describe AI regulation from inside the room where the rules were written. He has co-edited the Routledge Handbook of Artificial Intelligence and Philanthropy with the University of Geneva, the standard reference for AI in the social sector. That gives foundations and philanthropic boards a credible voice on the same subject. He has built and exited two AI companies and ranks in the top five per cent of the Numerai global leaderboard for market prediction models, so the technical claim is matched by personal track record. He is an OECD AI Expert and a World Economic Forum contributor, which means his framing is already calibrated for senior policy and regulatory audiences. Biography highlights Founder of the Altruist League, Geneva, a philanthropy consultancy whose network reports AUM above USD 10 billion. Chair of Executive AI, a network of CEOs of major European institutional investment organisations. AI Expert at the OECD and contributor at the World Economic Forum. Co-editor, The Routledge Handbook of Artificial Intelligence and Philanthropy, Routledge, 2024. Co-author, Fixing Philanthropy: Six Principles for Actually Improving the World When Giving Away Money, 2021. Educated at the London School of Economics, New York University and Harvard Business School. Biography Most institutional investors now have AI somewhere in their portfolio, their managers, or their operations. Very few have a working method for telling genuine machine learning from a factor model dressed up for a board meeting. That is the gap Maričić has spent his career filling, first inside his own AI ventures, now as Chair of Executive AI, the network of CEOs of major European institutional investment organisations. His SPEC framework, developed for capital allocators and published through CFA Institute’s Enterprising Investor, gives investment committees a short diagnostic for evaluating quantitative managers who claim AI capability. It is the kind of practical tool a CIO can take into a manager meeting on Monday morning. He represented the institutional investor industry in the EU Artificial Intelligence Act standardisation process, and serves as an AI Expert at the OECD and a contributor at the World Economic Forum. Maričić founded the Altruist League, a Geneva-based philanthropy consultancy that pioneered the use of AI in sourcing investments, distributing funds and managing portfolios, and whose network now reports AUM above USD 10 billion. With Giuseppe Ugazio at the University of Geneva, he co-edited The Routledge Handbook of Artificial Intelligence and Philanthropy, the 2024 reference work for foundations and social sector boards thinking about AI governance. He is educated at the London School of Economics, NYU and Harvard Business School, ranks in the top five per cent of the Numerai global leaderboard for market prediction models, and writes The Specification, a newsletter that translates frontier AI research into practical tools for institutional allocators. Key speaking topics AI governance for investment boards and fiduciary committees Due diligence on machine learning in quantitative investment strategies AI regulation, the EU AI Act and institutional capital allocation AI in philanthropy and the social sector Causal inference and the limits of factor investing Geopolitics of AI for sovereign wealth funds and central banks Trust-based giving and systemic-change philanthropy Ideal for Chief Investment Officers, investment committees and manager-selection teams at pension funds, sovereign wealth funds, central banks and endowments Boards of foundations and philanthropic organisations setting AI strategy and governance Risk, audit and fiduciary committees taking responsibility for AI-driven strategies they did not build Senior policy and regulatory audiences working on AI in financial services Audience outcomes A clear diagnostic for distinguishing real machine learning from AI marketing inside quantitative managers Specific questions a board or investment committee can put to managers and internal teams about AI claims A current read on the EU AI Act and what it means for institutional allocators in practice A grounded view of where AI is genuinely changing philanthropy and where it is hype A working vocabulary for fiduciary AI oversight that does not require a technical background

Why organisations work with Rory Cormac He brings archival-grade authority on how states actually conduct covert action, drawn from declassified British and allied intelligence records, not commentary or speculation. His work on the grey zone gives boards a structured way to read sabotage, subversion and information operations as connected forms of state pressure, not isolated incidents. He translates the playbooks of Russian and Chinese covert activity into specific implications for industries exposed to critical infrastructure, supply chains and intellectual property. How to Stage a Coup (Atlantic, 2022) is one of the few mainstream studies of secret statecraft to be taken seriously by both academic intelligence scholars and practitioners. Fakers (Oxford University Press, 2026) reads the British Cold War forgery operations as a working playbook for present-day state disinformation, giving leaders a historical pattern they can apply to current incidents. He has given oral evidence on foreign interference to parliamentary inquiries in both the UK and Australia, and has fronted three Channel 4 documentaries with Richard Aldrich on intelligence and the British state, making him equally credible in front of policy committees, expert rooms and public audiences. Biography highlights Professor of International Relations and lead for security and resilience research at the University of Nottingham, specialising in secret intelligence and covert action. Fellow of the Royal Historical Society; previous Leverhulme and AHRC Fellowships. Author of Fakers (Oxford University Press, 2026) on state disinformation, How to Stage a Coup (Atlantic, 2022), Disrupt and Deny (Oxford University Press, 2018) and Confronting the Colonies (Hurst, 2014). Co-author with Richard J. Aldrich of The Black Door and The Secret Royals: Spying and the Crown from Victoria to Diana (Atlantic, 2021). Co-presenter of three Channel 4 documentaries: Spying on the Royals, D-Day: The King who Fooled Hitler, The Queen and the Coup. Has given oral evidence on foreign interference to parliamentary inquiries in the UK and Australia, with regular appearances across national press, radio and television on intelligence matters. Biography Most boards still treat espionage as a film genre. The pipeline interruption, the leaked tender, the social media campaign that crashes a launch, the supplier suddenly entangled in a sanctions investigation: these are read as separate operational problems, not as connected acts of state pressure. The work of Rory Cormac, Professor of International Relations at the University of Nottingham, is to give senior leaders the language and the historical pattern recognition to see them as one problem. Cormac is Professor of International Relations and lead for security and resilience research at the University of Nottingham, specialising in covert action and secret statecraft. His authority is built on archival research into declassified British and allied records, the basis of Disrupt and Deny (Oxford University Press, 2018) and Confronting the Colonies (Hurst, 2014). With Richard J. Aldrich he co-authored The Black Door and The Secret Royals, broadening that material into a wider reading of how states use the hidden hand. How to Stage a Coup (Atlantic, 2022) brought the argument into the present. Eleven lessons drawn from a century of secret statecraft, applied to a world of sabotage, ambiguous warfare and adversaries operating just below the threshold of open conflict. Fakers (Oxford University Press, 2026) extends the work into disinformation directly, using the declassified history of Britain’s Cold War forgery operations to read the mechanics of present-day state influence campaigns. Both books sit at the centre of current debates on the grey zone among scholars and practitioners alike. Beyond the academy he is a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society, a former Leverhulme and AHRC Fellow, and a co-presenter with Aldrich of three Channel 4 documentaries on intelligence and the British state. He has also given oral evidence to parliamentary inquiries on foreign interference in both the UK and Australia. The result is a speaker who can hold a room of historians, a corporate security committee, and a Hay Festival audience using the same material. Key speaking topics Covert action and secret statecraft Grey-zone conflict and hybrid threats Russian and Chinese subversion Disinformation and information warfare Intelligence history and the modern state Political risk for critical infrastructure and IP-heavy sectors Resilience against sabotage and infiltration Ideal for Boards and risk committees in defence, energy, telecoms and critical infrastructure Chief security officers, heads of corporate intelligence and political risk leads Government, military and policy audiences working on national resilience Industry associations and conferences focused on geopolitical exposure Audience outcomes A clearer reading of how state adversaries combine sabotage, subversion and disinformation against commercial targets A working vocabulary for the grey zone that makes specific incidents legible as part of a larger pattern A historically grounded view of Russian and Chinese covert practice, rather than headline impressions Sharper questions for security, communications and supply-chain teams about where the organisation is exposed A sense of where the boundary sits between state interference and ordinary commercial risk

Why organisations work with Geoff Cutmore He has interviewed every president of the European Central Bank and the last three Bank of England governors, which means a central banker on his panel will recognise the questioning standard and answer accordingly. He moderated the Global Economic Outlook panel and other plenaries at the World Economic Forum in Davos for more than twenty years, including a 2022 session with Kristalina Georgieva, Jane Fraser, Francois Villeroy de Galhau, and David Rubenstein. His 2014 panel with Vladimir Putin at the St Petersburg International Economic Forum, which Putin closed by calling him a “scary person” who kept the conversation businesslike, is on the record as evidence of his composure with hostile principals. He authored New Market Mavericks (Wiley, 2004), a book of interviews with leading market traders, giving him a working vocabulary for the buy side as well as the policy desk. A decade based in Hong Kong with CNBC Asia before Europe gives him fluency on Boao, China Development Forum, and the Asia leg of any global economic story. Biography highlights Anchor of Squawk Box Europe on CNBC from 1999 to June 2023, after a thirty-year career across CNBC Asia and CNBC Europe. Author of New Market Mavericks, published by Wiley in 2004. Moderator of the Global Economic Outlook and other plenary sessions at the World Economic Forum in Davos for more than twenty years. Conducted on-stage interviews with Vladimir Putin at the St Petersburg International Economic Forum, Tony Blair, John Major, Gerhard Schroeder, and George Soros. Regular moderator at IMF and World Bank annual meetings, the Boao Forum, the China Development Forum, and United Nations Climate Change conferences. Contributor to the World Economic Forum Agenda. Biography Squawk Box Europe is where European institutional money starts its day, and from 1999 until June 2023 the person setting that agenda was Geoff Cutmore. Over three decades at CNBC, first in Hong Kong with CNBC Asia and then in Europe, he built the interviewing range that takes a guest from rate expectations to sanctions exposure to a board-level cash question without losing the room. The list of principals he has questioned on air or on stage is the working evidence. Every president of the European Central Bank. The last three governors of the Bank of England. US Treasury secretaries, IMF and World Bank heads, Tony Blair, John Major, Gerhard Schroeder, George Soros. In 2014 he chaired a ninety-minute panel with Vladimir Putin at the St Petersburg International Economic Forum, which closed with Putin calling him a “scary person” who had kept the exchange businesslike. That is the kind of credit only earned by holding a difficult line in front of a hostile principal. He has moderated the Global Economic Outlook panel and other plenaries at the World Economic Forum in Davos for more than twenty years, including the 2022 session with Kristalina Georgieva, Jane Fraser, Francois Villeroy de Galhau, and David Rubenstein. He also chairs sessions at the IMF and World Bank annual meetings, the Boao Forum, the China Development Forum, and United Nations climate conferences. His book New Market Mavericks, published by Wiley in 2004, collects interviews with leading traders and gives him a working second language for the buy side. What an organisation gets when it puts him on stage is a chair who has already had the conversation with the person sitting next to him, usually more than once, and who can move the panel through monetary policy, geopolitics, and corporate strategy without giving up the line of argument. Key speaking topics Global economic outlook and central bank policy Geopolitical risk and the world order Financial markets and investor strategy Energy transition and climate policy China and the Asia growth story Conference and panel moderation Senior executive interviews Ideal for Boards and investment committees commissioning a moderated session on the macro and geopolitical outlook CFO, treasury, and capital markets audiences requiring a chair who can question central bankers and policymakers on equal terms Global summits and annual conferences with multi-principal plenary panels on economy, energy, or geopolitics C-suite client events for asset managers, banks, and professional services firms Audience outcomes A clearer read on the current macro, monetary, and geopolitical picture from the principals shaping it, drawn out in real time rather than rehearsed. A session that holds shape across competing speakers, with the chair keeping the argument moving and the audience oriented. Specific named answers from policymakers and CEOs on the questions a senior audience actually has, not the questions a moderator has been briefed to ask. A conversation calibrated to the room, whether that is a Davos plenary, an investor day, or a board offsite.

Why organisations work with Horst Köhler Direct experience at the top of the IMF during the Brazil and Turkey debt crises, with operational responsibility for the response and for expanding debt relief to the poorest countries. Negotiator of the Maastricht Treaty on Economic and Monetary Union, giving boards a primary-source perspective on how the architecture of the eurozone was built and where its stress points lie. Sustained authority on Africa-Europe relations through the AU-EU High-Level Panel and the Partnership with Africa initiative he convened as Federal President. Rare combination of central-bank-adjacent technical credibility (EBRD presidency, IMF) with elected political legitimacy at head-of-state level. Biography highlights President of Germany, 2004 to 2010. Managing Director and Chairman of the Executive Board, International Monetary Fund, 2000 to 2004. President, European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, 1998 to 2000. State Secretary, German Federal Ministry of Finance, and Germany’s chief negotiator of the Maastricht Treaty on Economic and Monetary Union. UN Secretary-General’s Personal Envoy for Western Sahara, 2017 to 2019. Co-founder, Eva Luise and Horst Köhler Foundation for rare disease research, established 2006. Recipient of the Global Economy Prize, Kiel Institute, 2017. Biography The institutions that defined the post-1990 economic order were built in a specific moment. The Maastricht Treaty, the IMF’s debt-relief frameworks, the G7’s coordination architecture were all designed for a world that assumed open trade, declining inflation, and the gradual integration of emerging economies. Köhler spent his career inside those institutions at the moments they were being built and stress-tested. As State Secretary in the German Federal Ministry of Finance he was Germany’s chief negotiator on the Maastricht Treaty and on the German-German monetary union, before moving to the presidency of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development in 1998. From 2000 to 2004 he led the IMF through the Brazilian and Turkish debt crises and expanded debt relief for the world’s poorest economies. The technical brief and the political brief were the same brief. His presidency of Germany, 2004 to 2010, made the Africa-Europe relationship the centre of his public agenda. He convened the Partnership with Africa initiative as a sustained dialogue between heads of state, entrepreneurs, and intellectuals from both continents, and after leaving office co-chaired the African Union High-Level Panel on Africa-Europe relations and served as UN Personal Envoy for Western Sahara. The intellectual position underneath the work is that Europe still does not treat Africa as an independent political subject with its own agency and options. That argument, developed across two decades of speeches, is what made him a distinctive voice rather than a former office-holder on a circuit. Key speaking topics International monetary system and sovereign debt The Africa-Europe partnership The eurozone, Maastricht, and the architecture of EMU Global poverty reduction and development finance Multilateralism and the reform of international institutions Sustainability and climate finance Ideal for Boards and executive committees in financial services, multinational industrials, and infrastructure with material exposure to emerging markets, especially African economies. Government, multilateral, and development-finance audiences working on debt, climate finance, or institutional reform. Foundations, family offices, and impact-investment platforms with an Africa or Global South thesis. Audience outcomes A primary-source account of how the IMF actually handles a sovereign debt crisis at executive-board level. An informed view on what the AU-EU relationship looks like from inside the panels that have shaped it. A grounded reading of where the post-1990 multilateral order is brittle and where it still functions. Direct exposure to the strategic case for treating Africa as a peer political and economic counterpart, not an aid recipient.

Why organisations work with Raekwon Chung The Low Carbon Green Growth Roadmap, a UN publication Chung directed at ESCAP provides a named, five-track policy architecture for pursuing growth while reducing carbon intensity; organisations that understand this framework can make the economic case for climate investment, not just the compliance case. Very few speakers have shaped the rules of international climate governance from inside the room; Chung has participated in UN climate negotiations since 1991, advised a UN Secretary-General directly, and co-authored the IPCC’s foundational report on technology transfer. His specific IPCC contribution; the Technology Transfer Report addresses one of the least resolved tensions in corporate climate strategy: how emerging-market operations can access and deploy clean technologies at scale. The Green Growth argument Chung developed is an economic one, not a moral one; he shows how resource efficiency and low-carbon investment can generate a double dividend; higher growth with lower environmental impact, a position grounded in a verifiable UN policy architecture rather than consulting opinion. As Board Director for Climate and Energy at the Ban Ki-moon Foundation for a Better Future, he remains an active participant in the international climate architecture rather than a commentator on it. Biography highlights Korea’s first Climate Change Ambassador; engaged in UN climate negotiations since 1991 Principal Climate Change Advisor to UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon Director, Environment and Development Division, UN ESCAP; led development of the Low Carbon Green Growth Roadmap for Asia and the Pacific (2012) IPCC Lead Author, Technology Transfer Report; received personal copy of the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize awarded to the IPCC Chairman, International Award Committee, Global Energy Prize Board Director for Climate and Energy, Ban Ki-moon Foundation for a Better Future; Professor Emeritus, Incheon National University, Korea Biography Whether climate action and economic growth can be pursued simultaneously is no longer a theoretical question: it is the defining tension in development strategy. Raekwon Chung has spent three decades not analysing that question but helping to answer it, from South Korea’s first climate ambassador to the UN official who directed the Low Carbon Green Growth Roadmap. The Roadmap, published in 2012 under Chung’s leadership at the UN Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific, set out a five-track policy architecture for governments pursuing growth while reducing carbon intensity. It became a reference document for Asia-Pacific policymakers and shaped how international institutions framed the relationship between development economics and climate obligations. The core argument is economic: resource efficiency and low-carbon investment generate a double dividend: higher growth alongside lower environmental impact. His direct involvement in the institutions that set climate rules is unusual. He served as Principal Climate Change Advisor to UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and was Lead Author on the IPCC’s Technology Transfer Report. The IPCC was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2007; Chung received a personal copy in recognition of his contribution. He also proposed the concept of unilateral CDM, enabling developing countries to initiate emissions reduction projects independently, without waiting for partner-country involvement. He now chairs the International Award Committee of the Global Energy Prize and serves as Board Director for Climate and Energy at the Ban Ki-moon Foundation for a Better Future. His perspective is that of a practitioner inside the international climate architecture, not an observer of it. Key speaking topics Low-carbon development policy Green Growth as economic strategy International climate governance Climate diplomacy and multilateral negotiation Energy transition in emerging economies Technology transfer and clean energy access ESG strategy and climate-aligned investment Ideal for Government ministers, senior civil servants, and diplomats engaged in climate policy or international negotiations Chief Sustainability Officers and ESG leads at multinationals with Asia-Pacific exposure or supply chain decarbonisation mandates Boards and executive committees making the economic case for net-zero commitments International organisations and multilateral institutions working on development finance or energy transition Audience outcomes A clearer understanding of how international climate frameworks are designed, and how organisations can position themselves within them rather than simply react to them The economic logic of Green Growth as a lens for reframing climate investment as a development opportunity rather than a compliance cost Insight into the real dynamics of multilateral climate negotiation and what drives national ambition levels Practical perspectives on technology transfer and clean energy access, particularly relevant for emerging-market operations and supply chain decarbonisation Context for the convergence of climate policy, development economics, and energy transition across the Asia-Pacific region

Why organisations work with Ritula Shah Fifteen years anchoring BBC Radio 4’s The World Tonight gives her the editorial reflexes to keep a senior panel honest under time pressure, on the record, without losing the audience. A working seat on the RUSI Advisory Board means she walks into defence, security and geopolitics briefings already inside the conversation, not learning it from a brief. Reporting experience from Guantanamo Bay, China, India, Brazil and Jordan gives her first-hand reference points when a panel drifts into abstraction on foreign policy or human rights. She is one of a small number of UK broadcasters trusted by ministers, regulators and dissenting voices to chair a discussion that needs to be both serious and broadcast-quality. Her ambassadorial work with the British Asian Trust and trusteeship of INIVA make her a credible host for organisations who want representation handled without performance. Biography highlights Lead presenter, The World Tonight, BBC Radio 4 (15 years, to 2023). Former presenter, The Real Story (BBC World Service), Woman’s Hour, The World Today, One to One. Current weekday-evening presenter, Calm Classics, Classic FM. Advisory Board member, Royal United Services Institute (RUSI). Ambassador, British Asian Trust; trustee, INIVA. Honorary Doctor of Letters, University of Warwick (2019). Biography The World Tonight is the BBC Radio 4 programme senior leaders, diplomats and ministers tend to listen to on the drive home. Ritula Shah presented it for fifteen years. That fact alone places her in a small group of UK broadcasters who have spent a working career interrogating finance ministers, foreign secretaries, sanctioned oligarchs, generals and dissidents on the record, in real time, with no second take. The geographical footprint matters here. She has reported from Guantanamo Bay, China, India, Brazil, Jordan, Finland and Germany, and covered the Soviet collapse, 9/11 from New York, multiple US and UK elections and the slow grind of Brexit. When a panel on supply chains, sanctions or political risk drifts into theory, she pulls it back to a place she has actually been. The think-tank work is not decorative. Shah sits on the Advisory Board of RUSI, the world’s oldest defence and security institute, which means she chairs geopolitics and security sessions already inside the institutional conversation rather than reading in. She is also an ambassador for the British Asian Trust, a trustee of INIVA, and an honorary Doctor of Letters of the University of Warwick. For organisations, the practical offer is rarer than a keynote. She is a broadcaster who can take a sensitive board conversation, a regulator panel, a closed-room briefing on China exposure or a high-profile awards ceremony, and run it at the standard of a Radio 4 broadcast. The room hears something true, the recording is usable, and the senior speakers do not feel ambushed. Key speaking topics Geopolitics and the multipolar world International affairs and foreign policy Defence and national security News literacy and trust in media Inclusion, identity and belonging in public life Conference, panel and awards moderation Board-level event chairing Ideal for Boards and executive committees commissioning a geopolitical, sanctions or China-exposure session Defence, security, foreign policy and policy-research convenings Awards ceremonies and flagship annual conferences requiring a broadcast-grade host Regulators, professional bodies and universities running on-the-record panels with public figures Audience outcomes A clearer mental map of where the multipolar world is actually moving, beyond headline framing Better-quality contributions from senior panellists, because the questions are sharper and the chairing is firmer A working sense of how to read news critically in an environment of declining trust and rising misinformation Confidence that a difficult conversation, on geopolitics, identity or institutional reform, can be held in public without becoming theatre

Why organisations work with Jacinda Ardern Ardern made consequential governance decisions – not advisory ones – during a live-streamed act of mass terrorism, a major volcanic eruption, and a global pandemic, all within a single term in office. What she brings to organisations is a practitioner’s account of crisis governance under conditions of maximum accountability. She co-founded the Christchurch Call with French President Macron in 2019 and remains Patron of the Christchurch Call Foundation today. That initiative – a multi-government, multi-platform framework for eliminating terrorist content online – gives her grounded authority on AI governance, platform accountability, and digital regulation that most governance specialists cannot match. Her memoir A Different Kind of Power (Penguin Random House/Pan Macmillan, 2025), a New York Times and Sunday Times bestseller, develops the concept of “pragmatic idealism” – the argument, backed by her own record in office, that empathy and decisive institutional action reinforce each other rather than pull against each other. Her Harvard appointments span three distinct domains: public leadership (Hauser Leader, Center for Public Leadership), AI and platform governance (Knight Tech Governance Leadership Fellow, Berkman Klein Center), and women’s policy (Senior Fellow, Women and Public Policy Program). This breadth reflects genuine multi-domain institutional credibility. As board member of The Earthshot Prize and Arnhold Distinguished Fellow at Conservation International, she engages with climate accountability at the level of institutional design – not as a cause, but as a governance and measurement problem that boards increasingly own. Biography highlights 40th Prime Minister of New Zealand, 2017-2023; the world’s youngest female head of government at the time of her election, aged 37 Led the governmental response to the Christchurch mosque attacks (2019), the Whakaari White Island volcanic eruption, and the COVID-19 pandemic – each requiring real-time governance decisions at national scale Co-founded the Christchurch Call with President Macron (2019); Patron of the Christchurch Call Foundation, the NGO established by New Zealand and France in 2024 to coordinate global action on violent extremist content online Multiple Harvard fellowships across Harvard Kennedy School and Harvard Law School’s Berkman Klein Center for Internet and Society, including the Angelopoulos Global Public Leaders Fellow, Hauser Leader at the Center for Public Leadership, and Knight Tech Governance Leadership Fellow Author of A Different Kind of Power (Penguin Random House / Pan Macmillan, 2025) – New York Times and Sunday Times bestseller; shortlisted for the Ockham New Zealand Book Awards Harvard Kennedy School Gleitsman International Activist Award (2020); Harvard 2022 Commencement speaker; Honorary Doctorate from Harvard University; twice named to Time Magazine’s Most Influential People list Board member, The Earthshot Prize; Arnhold Distinguished Fellow, Conservation International; founder of the Field Fellowship on empathetic leadership (2024) Biography New Zealand was four weeks past the Christchurch mosque attacks when Jacinda Ardern stood with French President Macron in Paris and co-launched the Christchurch Call – a commitment from governments and technology companies to eliminate terrorist and violent extremist content online. It was a governance response to a governance failure, assembled at pace, and it is still operating. That sequence captures what is most useful about Ardern’s perspective: she did not observe the intersection of crisis leadership, platform accountability, and public trust from the outside. She was accountable for it. Her concept of “pragmatic idealism” – developed across her term in office and set out in her memoir A Different Kind of Power (Penguin Random House/Pan Macmillan, 2025, a New York Times and Sunday Times bestseller) – makes the case that empathy is not a soft alternative to decisive leadership but a structural condition of it. Leaders who build genuine trust before a crisis hits have more to draw on when decisions must be made under pressure and incomplete information. Leaders who do not find that the crisis itself destroys the conditions needed to manage it. Since leaving office in early 2023, Ardern has held multiple fellowships at Harvard Kennedy School and Harvard Law School’s Berkman Klein Center for Internet and Society, where her focus has been AI governance, algorithmic accountability, and platform regulation. She is board member of The Earthshot Prize, Patron of the Christchurch Call Foundation, Arnhold Distinguished Fellow at Conservation International, and founder of the Field Fellowship, a programme supporting political leaders in empathetic leadership practice. For boards navigating crisis preparedness, digital governance, or ESG accountability, Ardern brings a record of decisions taken, at national scale, under conditions that most leadership frameworks were not designed for. Key speaking topics Crisis decision-making and governance under pressure Trust, institutional credibility, and stakeholder communication Digital platform accountability and online safety AI governance and technology regulation Climate accountability and ESG leadership Empathetic leadership and values-based decision-making Women in leadership and inclusive governance Ideal for Board and C-suite audiences responsible for crisis response, reputation management, and stakeholder trust under public scrutiny Technology and digital governance leaders focused on platform accountability, AI regulation, and online safety policy ESG and sustainability officers translating climate commitments into credible, auditable, scrutiny-resistant action Public sector and government-adjacent leaders managing delivery under high institutional pressure Audience outcomes A practical decision-making framework developed through direct, accountable experience of national-scale crisis – not theoretical modelling A sharper understanding of how trust is built, maintained, and lost under crisis conditions – and what communication disciplines make the difference Grounded perspective on digital platform accountability and AI governance from someone who helped design one of the world’s first functioning multi-government frameworks in this space A working account of how “pragmatic idealism” operates as a leadership model: acting from values without sacrificing speed, coherence, or institutional effectiveness Concrete principles for maintaining organisational credibility when multiple stakeholder groups are applying conflicting pressure simultaneously

Why organisations work with Tim Hames He has run the trade body for British private equity and venture capital, so he speaks to investors, allocators and operators in their own language, not as an outside commentator. His China analysis is built on close study of the Chinese Communist Party’s internal operations, which is the level boards need when sanctions, supply chain and market access decisions are on the table. He spent a decade as chief leader writer and assistant editor at The Times, which means he can frame a complex political argument tightly enough for a board paper or an investor letter. He served as the first Special Adviser to the Speaker of the House of Commons, giving him direct experience of how Westminster machinery actually moves. He co-wrote The Long Shot with Dame Kate Bingham, the definitive insider account of the UK Vaccine Taskforce, and a Financial Times science book of the year. Biography highlights Director General of the British Private Equity and Venture Capital Association (BVCA), 2013 to 2019. Co-founder of Acuti Associates, a UK, US and China political and geopolitical risk advisory. Co-author with Dame Kate Bingham of The Long Shot: The Inside Story of the Race to Vaccinate Britain (Oneworld, 2022); Sunday Times business bestseller, FT science book of the year, Money Week politics book of the year. Former Assistant Editor, chief leader writer and weekly political columnist at The Times. First Special Adviser to the Speaker of the House of Commons, with a brief on parliamentary reform. Former Lecturer in Politics at Oxford University, 1989 to 1996, specialising in American and British government. Biography Most political risk advice on offer to boards is written by people who have only ever observed politics from outside. Hames has worked inside three of the systems that matter, Westminster, the British press, and the City, and the value comes from how he connects them. His BVCA years gave him an investor’s reflex for capital flows; his Times years taught him to write a sharp, defensible argument; his Speaker’s Office year showed him how Parliament actually decides. That combination shapes the way he reads the UK, US and China triangle through Acuti Associates, the advisory firm he co-founded. The focus is practical: what does a Trump second term mean for trans-Atlantic deal flow, how should a board think about China exposure when the signals from Beijing are deliberately opaque, what does the UK regulatory direction look like after a change of government. The answers are not generic. His co-authored book with Dame Kate Bingham, The Long Shot, is the inside record of the UK Vaccine Taskforce, the rare British state-led project of the last decade that actually worked. It was a Financial Times science book of the year and a Sunday Times business bestseller, and it doubles as a study in how political and commercial decision-making interact under pressure. He continues to advise financial institutions, professional services firms and technology companies, and serves as a Senior Adviser to FTI Consulting’s strategic communications practice. The work he is asked to do is consistent: translate political signal into commercial decision, before the headlines force the issue. Key speaking topics UK, US and China political risk Geopolitical risk for boards and investors US politics and the Trump factor Chinese Communist Party decision-making UK government, regulation and the post-election landscape Private equity and venture capital policy environment Lessons from the UK Vaccine Taskforce Ideal for Boards and investment committees with material China, US or UK regulatory exposure Private equity and venture capital firms briefing LPs on political risk Financial services and professional services leadership teams CEO and CFO offsites where geopolitics is a standing agenda item Audience outcomes A clearer read on what to take seriously and what to discount in current US, UK and China political coverage. Sharper questions to put to in-house government affairs, public policy and risk teams. A practical sense of how Westminster, Washington and Beijing actually decide, not how they are reported. A more disciplined frame for board discussions on China exposure, sanctions risk and regulatory direction.

Why organisations work with Penny Mordaunt A former Cabinet minister with direct authority on three of the topics now sitting on most board agendas: defence, trade policy, and international development. Front-line experience of UK trade reorientation, including the country’s accession to CPTPP and bilateral economic agreements with US states, useful to companies modelling supply chain and market access decisions. Built and led the cross-government defensive cyber function in its early form, and rebuilt UK civil contingencies and resilience as Paymaster General. Practical credibility on national resilience, not commentary. Read by US and Commonwealth audiences as a serious British voice on the transatlantic relationship; now Chair of the Coalition for Global Prosperity, where her case is that aid and defence are part of national resilience, not philanthropy. A genuine speaker, not a politician reading remarks. Parliamentary Wit of the Year and Spectator Speech of the Year, with a global audience earned at the 2023 Coronation. Biography highlights Former Secretary of State for Defence; first woman to hold the role. Former Secretary of State for International Development and UK Governor at the World Bank. Former Minister of State for Trade Policy; oversaw UK accession to CPTPP and bilateral economic agreements with US states. Former Lord President of the Council and Leader of the House of Commons; carried the Sword of State at the Coronation of King Charles III in 2023. Co-author of Greater: Britain After the Storm, winner of the 2021 Parliamentary Book Award. Appointed Chair of the Coalition for Global Prosperity in January 2025; made a Dame in the King’s Birthday Honours 2025. Honorary Captain, MCM2 Squadron, Royal Naval Reserve. Biography Trade, defence and development used to be three separate conversations inside government. They are now a single conversation, and most boards are catching up to it. The leaders who understand this best tend to be the ones who have held responsibility for all three. Penny Mordaunt is one of a small group who has. She served fourteen years as MP for Portsmouth North, holding nine ministerial roles across four Cabinet posts. She was the first woman to serve as Secretary of State for Defence, ran the Department for International Development, and as Minister of State for Trade Policy oversaw the UK’s accession to the CPTPP and a series of economic agreements at US state level. As Paymaster General she rebuilt the UK’s civil contingencies and resilience capability, and built the first cross-government defensive cyber lead. Her public profile is wider than Westminster. She carried the 17th-century Sword of State at the Coronation of King Charles III in 2023, the first woman to do so, and the role gave her a global audience that few former Cabinet ministers ever acquire. Her book Greater: Britain After the Storm, co-authored with Chris Lewis, won the 2021 Parliamentary Book Award and reached bestseller lists in the UK and US. Since leaving Parliament in 2024 she has chaired the Coalition for Global Prosperity, where she argues the case for the transatlantic partnership and for treating development and defence as components of national resilience rather than discretionary spend. For corporate audiences, the value is the access to a former insider’s view of how trade policy, sanctions architecture and security commitments are actually made, and what changes when an election cycle turns over. Key speaking topics UK trade policy, CPTPP and US state-level economic agreements Defence, security and the transatlantic relationship International development as national resilience Geopolitical risk and the future of the rules-based order Civil contingencies, cyber and national resilience Women in public leadership Ideal for Board and C-suite audiences modelling geopolitical and trade exposure CFOs and strategy teams reassessing market access and supply chain decisions post-Brexit and post-CPTPP CISOs and risk officers working at the intersection of cyber, national security and corporate resilience Public affairs, government affairs and ESG leaders briefing on UK policy direction Audience outcomes A clearer view of how UK and transatlantic policy choices translate into commercial and operational risk. A more accurate read of the post-Brexit trade architecture, including CPTPP and bilateral US engagement. A practical framing of national resilience that connects defence, cyber, supply chain and civil contingencies. An informed sense of where the UK government sees its own room for manoeuvre in a contested global order.