Storytelling & Business Communication

Why organisations work with Kate Silverton A trusted, recognisable broadcaster who can hold a room of senior leaders, run a Q&A with executives, and chair a panel without losing the thread, which is why McLaren, KPMG, Transport for London, NatWest, Lloyds, and American Express have used her at conferences and ceremonies. A qualified child therapist trained through Place2Be, with a BSc in Psychology and clinical practice, which makes her credible to parental-leave, family-benefits, and employee-wellbeing audiences in a way few broadcasters are. Author of two Sunday Times bestsellers on child development, including an instant Sunday Times number one, giving her a defined public thesis on how the developing brain shapes behaviour. Two decades of frontline reporting, including Iraq and Afghanistan for Panorama, which gives her real ballast when chairing serious conversations rather than purely celebratory ones. Ambassador roles with Place2Be, the Anna Freud Centre, NSPCC, and Trauma Informed Schools UK, which sit naturally alongside corporate ESG, mental health, and family-benefits commitments. Biography highlights Former BBC News presenter, including BBC News at One and BBC Weekend News, and Panorama reporter from Iraq and Afghanistan. BSc in Psychology; qualified child therapist trained through the Place2Be charity. Author of “There’s No Such Thing As ‘Naughty'”, an instant Sunday Times No.1 bestseller, and its follow-up “There’s Still No Such Thing As ‘Naughty'”. Conference and awards host for Transport for London, KPMG, NatWest, Lloyds, McLaren, the NHS, and American Express. Ambassador for Place2Be, the Anna Freud Centre, NSPCC, NHS Maudsley Foundation Trust, and Trauma Informed Schools UK. Contestant on BBC’s Strictly Come Dancing, Series 16, in 2018. Biography Most parenting advice is folklore. Silverton’s books are a deliberate counter to that, written by a journalist who went back to the science. “There’s No Such Thing As ‘Naughty'” reached number one on the Sunday Times bestseller list on release, and the follow-up volume covered the primary years on the same evidence base. The route to that work is unusual. Two decades inside the BBC, presenting BBC News at One and BBC Weekend News, and reporting from Iraq and Afghanistan for Panorama, gave her the public profile. A BSc in Psychology and a clinical retraining through the Place2Be charity gave her the substance. She qualified as a child therapist in 2023 and now combines clinical practice with writing and corporate work. For organisations, the value sits in two places. The first is hosting craft. Conferences and award ceremonies for Transport for London, KPMG, NatWest, Lloyds, McLaren, the NHS, and American Express trust her to chair senior conversations and run executive Q&As without losing rigour. The second is content. When the brief is wellbeing, working parents, or the emotional regulation that sits underneath leadership composure, she has a defined thesis grounded in clinical work and published research, not anecdote. Her ambassadorial work with Place2Be, the Anna Freud Centre, NSPCC, NHS Maudsley Foundation Trust, and Trauma Informed Schools UK keeps her connected to the front edge of children’s mental health practice in the UK, which is the source material her keynote draws on. Key speaking topics Children’s mental health and emotional development The science of parenting and behaviour Working parents and family-friendly workplaces Employee wellbeing and emotional regulation Conference hosting and panel moderation After-dinner speaking Ideal for Heads of HR, reward, and benefits leaders shaping parental and family wellbeing programmes Conference and event organisers needing a senior, calm, journalistically credible host Internal communications and leadership-development teams running wellbeing or working-parent strands Award ceremony and industry-event organisers seeking a trusted on-stage presenter Audience outcomes A clearer model of how brain development shapes the behaviour of children, and what that implies for parents inside the workforce Practical language for managers and HR leaders speaking to working parents on stress, regulation, and family pressure A grounded view of what employer-sponsored mental health and family support actually has to do to make a difference For hosted events, sharper executive Q&As, tighter panel discussions, and a credible on-stage thread between sessions

Why organisations work with Kate Garraway She brings the rare combination of a national household name and a serious, specific subject: the lived reality of being a working carer, drawn from her own years caring for her late husband Derek Draper. Her interviewing craft is honed on live national television. She handles unscripted rooms, sensitive subject matter and senior executives on stage with the same control she shows on Good Morning Britain. Three consecutive National Television Awards for her authored documentaries give her authority on duty-of-care and social-care themes that few corporate speakers can match. She moves credibly between hosting an awards night, anchoring a conference, conducting an on-stage CEO interview and delivering a personal keynote on resilience, without changing register awkwardly between formats. Her MBE for broadcasting, journalism and charity makes her a natural fit for client events that need a name guests recognise from their breakfast television. Biography highlights Main presenter on ITV’s Good Morning Britain since launch in 2014. Host of the weekday mid-morning show on Smooth Radio since 2014. Host of ITV’s Life Stories, succeeding Piers Morgan, from 2021. MBE in the 2022 New Year Honours for services to broadcasting, journalism and charity. Author of two Sunday Times bestsellers, The Power of Hope (2021) and The Strength of Love (2023). Winner of three National Television Awards for her ITV documentaries Finding Derek, Caring for Derek and Derek’s Story, plus a TRIC Special Award for her broadcasting career. Biography The hardest conversations in modern workplaces are not about strategy. They are about the colleague managing a parent’s dementia, the senior leader whose partner has a long-term illness, the high performer whose home life has quietly become a second full-time role. Kate Garraway has spent the last five years living and reporting that reality in public. Most viewers know her from ITV’s Good Morning Britain, where she has been a main presenter since the programme launched in 2014, and from her weekday show on Smooth Radio. The wider broadcasting CV runs through GMTV, Daybreak and ITV’s Life Stories, the long-running interview series she took over from Piers Morgan in 2021. The TRIC Special Award and her 2022 MBE for services to broadcasting, journalism and charity sit alongside that work. The body of work that gives her something distinctive to say to corporate audiences is more recent. After her husband Derek Draper became one of the UK’s most seriously affected long Covid patients, she made three authored documentaries for ITV, Finding Derek, Caring for Derek and Kate Garraway: Derek’s Story, each of which won the National Television Award for Best Authored Documentary. Her two memoirs, The Power of Hope and The Strength of Love, were Sunday Times bestsellers and turned her into one of the country’s most quoted voices on caring, resilience and the social-care system. What she offers in a corporate room is a presenter who can hold a live audience for a full event and, when the brief calls for it, speak with first-hand authority on what it actually costs employees to look after someone they love while staying in their job. Key speaking topics Working carers and the hidden workforce Resilience and personal leadership through crisis Long-term illness and return-to-work Mental health and wellbeing at work Live event hosting and on-stage interviewing Awards hosting and conference moderation Broadcast journalism and media interviewing Ideal for Conferences and awards evenings looking for a household-name host with strong interview craft. HR, reward and benefits leaders building credible support for working carers and employees with long-term illness. Wellbeing, DEI and ERG events that need a public figure who can speak from experience rather than theory. Boards and leadership offsites running an on-stage CEO or guest interview where a trained journalist adds value. Audience outcomes A clearer view of what caring responsibilities look like inside their own workforce, and how often they go unspoken. Practical language for managers having difficult conversations with employees facing serious illness at home. A grounded perspective on resilience that does not flatten into motivational cliche. For hosted formats, a tightly run event with senior guests interviewed at the level they expect from national television.

Why organisations work with Julia Streets Twenty-five years inside financial services, from senior roles at NYSE Euronext and Instinet to founding Streets Consulting, gives her unusual fluency across the language of trading floors, regulators, fintechs and boards. DiverCity Podcast, which she launched in 2017 as the first DE&I podcast in financial services, has run 16 seasons with listeners in more than 50 countries and gives her a documented track record of holding industry leaders to specific commitments, not slogans. An MBE in the 2025 King’s Birthday Honours, awarded for services to diversity and inclusion in entrepreneurship in financial services and technology, is a credential almost no other speaker in her topic area carries. Her host and moderator craft, sharpened by years on the stand-up circuit, makes her a credible choice for conferences where the chair has to keep senior bankers, regulators and founders in the same conversation without flattening any of them. She advises fintech founders and global institutions on the same set of growth and communication problems, which means she can speak to both sides of the buyer-vendor relationship in the room. Biography highlights Founder and CEO of Streets Consulting, advising fintech startups, scaleups and global financial institutions on growth, marketing and communications. MBE, 2025 King’s Birthday Honours, for services to diversity and inclusion in entrepreneurship in financial services and technology. Host and executive producer of DiverCity Podcast, the first DE&I podcast in financial services, with 16 seasons and listeners across 50 countries. Author of The Lingua Franca of the Corporate Banker, published by Searching Finance. Former senior executive at NYSE Euronext (global head of communications, technology division) and Instinet (European marketing and sales development). Twice named a Global Diversity Champion in the Global Diversity List; three-time Brummell Magazine listee for women on boards, women entrepreneurs and women of influence in the City. Trustee of Street Child; regular broadcast contributor on BBC Radio 4, BBC Radio Kent and City AM. Biography The first DE&I podcast in financial services launched in 2017 with no obvious commercial reason to exist. Sixteen seasons later, DiverCity Podcast has listeners in more than fifty countries and a back catalogue of named industry figures committing on the record to specific changes. The host and executive producer is Julia Streets, and the show is one piece of a wider body of work on how financial services actually changes, rather than how it announces it does. Streets Consulting, which she founded after senior roles at NYSE Euronext and Instinet, advises fintechs and global institutions on growth, positioning and communications. The brief is the same on both sides: how does a firm explain what it does to people who are paid to be sceptical of it. Two decades inside trading-floor culture, and a 2012 satirical book on corporate jargon, The Lingua Franca of the Corporate Banker, give her a low tolerance for the kind of language that lets executives avoid saying anything specific. The 2025 MBE, awarded in the King’s Birthday Honours for services to diversity and inclusion in entrepreneurship in financial services and technology, sits alongside two listings as a Global Diversity Champion and three appearances on Brummell Magazine’s lists of women on boards, women entrepreneurs and women of influence in the City. The recognitions track a single argument across her work: that diversity in finance is a commercial question, not a compliance one, and that it should be measured by who gets hired, promoted and listened to. For an audience, the practical effect is a speaker and host who can move between fintech innovation, capital markets technology and DE&I without losing the room, because she has actually built a business in each. She is also a former stand-up comedian, which is why bankers tend to talk back to her on stage rather than at her. Key speaking topics Fintech innovation and capital markets technology Diversity, equity and inclusion in financial services Entrepreneurship in regulated industries Communication and influence for senior leaders AI and the future of financial services Conference chairing and panel moderation Women in fintech and technology Ideal for Boards and executive teams in banking, capital markets and fintech navigating technology adoption and regulatory change. CHROs and DE&I leads in financial services who need a credible external voice on inclusion that holds up to commercial scrutiny. Founders and investors at fintech scaleups working on positioning, growth and institutional credibility. Conference organisers in financial services who need a chair or moderator with subject fluency across innovation, regulation and culture. Audience outcomes A clearer view of where fintech innovation is genuinely changing financial services and where it is being oversold. Specific, named examples of how DE&I commitments translate into hiring, promotion and product decisions, drawn from sixteen seasons of recorded interviews. Direct, jargon-stripped language for talking about technology change inside regulated organisations. A working sense of how fintech founders and incumbents see each other, useful for anyone building or buying across that line.

Why organisations work with Joanna Gasiorowska A working read on the geopolitics of global sport from someone who has covered the FIFA corruption scandal, Russian doping, and the awarding of the World Cup to Russia and Qatar as live news, not as commentary after the fact. Front-line tournament experience across the Summer and Winter Olympics, European football championships, the Ryder Cup, Diamond League athletics, and FIFA World Cup qualifiers across the Middle East and Africa. A senior anchor’s stage craft, drawn from presenting live bulletins on Al Jazeera English’s Newshour and AJNewsgrid since the channel’s 2006 launch, plus prior on-air work at ITN and Sky Sports. A view of the Gulf’s role in global sport that is informed by being based inside the region’s flagship international broadcaster, useful for clients running events, sponsorships, or partnerships tied to Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the wider region. Biography highlights Senior sports presenter, reporter and producer at Al Jazeera English since the channel’s launch in 2006, with on-air roles on Newshour and on the daily social media programme AJNewsgrid. Previously a sports reporter on ITV’s Evening News and a daily sports presenter on the ITV News Channel, with additional reporting experience at Sky Sports. Reported across the Summer and Winter Olympics, the 2012 European football championships in Poland, the Ryder Cup, Diamond League athletics, and FIFA World Cup qualifiers across the Middle East and Africa. Covered the FIFA corruption scandal, Russian doping revelations, and FIFA’s awarding of the 2018 and 2022 World Cups to Russia and Qatar. BA from City, University of London. Biography The corruption scandal that took down a generation of FIFA officials, the Russian doping revelations that pulled state athletes out of two Olympic cycles, and the World Cup awards to Russia and Qatar all broke as live news on the same handful of international channels. Al Jazeera English was one of them, and Gasiorowska was inside its sports operation as those stories landed. She has been with Al Jazeera English since the channel went on air from Doha in 2006, presenting live sports bulletins on Newshour and on the daily social media programme AJNewsgrid. The reporting CV around it is wide: Summer and Winter Olympics, the 2012 European football championships in Poland, the Ryder Cup, Diamond League athletics, FIFA World Cup qualifiers across the Middle East and Africa. Before Doha she came up through UK network news. She reported sport for the UK’s ITN, including on ITV’s Evening News and as a daily sports presenter on the ITV News Channel, with additional reporting work at Sky Sports. She holds a BA from City, University of London. The result for a buyer is a speaker who can read the geopolitics of global sport from the inside of a newsroom that has covered every major case of the last twenty years, and can do it on stage with a senior live anchor’s timing. Key speaking topics The geopolitics of global sport Sports governance, FIFA, and the IOC Doping, corruption, and sports integrity The Gulf as a host market for global sport Olympic and World Cup tournament cycles Sports broadcasting and live news craft Ideal for Heads of partnerships, sponsorship leads, and CMOs underwriting Olympic, FIFA, or Gulf-hosted sports properties Corporate affairs and risk leads scoping reputational exposure on sports governance, doping, and host-nation politics Event organisers running sports industry conferences, after-dinner programmes, and panel sessions on tournament strategy Communications teams briefing executives ahead of major tournaments hosted in the Middle East Audience outcomes A working map of how FIFA, the IOC, and major federations actually award tournaments and police themselves A clearer view of why doping and corruption cases recur, and what changes after each cycle A read on the Gulf’s strategic positioning in global sport from inside a regional broadcaster Front-line colour from the Olympics, the World Cup, the Ryder Cup, and Diamond League athletics that informs sponsorship, partnership, and event decisions

Why organisations work with Jane Garvey Thirteen years anchoring Woman’s Hour gives her a working command of the gender, workplace and culture agenda that few corporate chairs can match. She launched BBC Radio 5 Live on air in 1994 and has been live every week since, on Radio 4, Radio 5 Live and now Times Radio. The composure transfers directly to a corporate stage. Four Sony Gold Awards for the Radio 5 Live Drive programme, including the 2002 News Broadcaster Gold Medal, give her a verifiable editorial standing rather than a borrowed celebrity profile. The Off Air podcast with Fi Glover has passed 10 million listens, demonstrating a current, active audience and a register that lands with professional listeners, not only consumer ones. She runs a room. After-dinner, on-stage interviews, panel chairs and awards hosting are her core commercial product, not an extension of a keynote practice. Biography highlights First voice on air at the launch of BBC Radio 5 Live, 28 March 1994. Presented BBC Radio 4’s Woman’s Hour for thirteen years, October 2007 to December 2020. Four Sony Gold Awards on the Radio 5 Live Drive show with Peter Allen, including the 2002 News Broadcaster Gold Medal. Co-host of the Times Radio afternoon show and the Off Air podcast, which has passed 10 million listens. Co-author with Fi Glover of Did I Say That Out Loud? Notes on the Chuff of Life, Trapeze, 2021. Honorary doctorate, University of Birmingham, 2019. Biography Radio 5 Live went on air at five in the morning on 28 March 1994. The first voice listeners heard was Jane Garvey’s. Three decades later she is still doing live broadcast every week, now on Times Radio, having moved through Radio 4’s Woman’s Hour, the BBC’s Fortunately podcast and a string of news and documentary projects on the way. Live broadcasting at that level is, in practice, the same skill organisations now ask of senior chairs. You are listening to three things at once. You are deciding which line to follow. You are protecting the listener’s interest against the speaker’s habits. Garvey has been doing that without a script for thirty years, on subjects ranging from a chancellor’s spending review to a Supreme Court nomination to the gender pay gap inside the BBC itself. The editorial register comes from Woman’s Hour. Across thirteen years she interviewed politicians, executives, authors and ordinary contributors on the working lives of women, the policy that shapes them and the leaders who set the tone. That work earned a Sony News Broadcaster Gold Medal in 2002 for the Radio 5 Live Drive programme, three further Sony Golds with Peter Allen, and an honorary doctorate from the University of Birmingham in 2019. The current evidence sits in Off Air, the podcast she co-hosts with Fi Glover for The Times. It has passed 10 million listens. The pair were nominated for Best Speech Presenter at the 2024 ARIAS. For corporate buyers, that is the most useful proof point. The audience is live, the register is professional, and the craft has not slipped. Key speaking topics Panel chairing and on-stage interviewing Awards hosting and after-dinner presentation Women at work and the gender agenda Workplace culture and generational change Media, journalism and public conversation Leadership conversations on inclusion Ideal for CEOs, CHROs and communications leads who need a chair for a senior internal or client-facing event Conference and awards organisers booking a host who can hold a serious room Boards and leadership teams running gender, workplace or culture conversations that need a credible moderator Audience outcomes A live conversation that moves, with executives drawn out rather than allowed to drift A clearer view of the gender and workplace agenda from someone who has covered it as a working journalist for two decades An event that finishes on time, with the headline points captured A room that leaves with something specific to repeat, not a generic recap

Why organisations work with Holly Tucker She built a marketplace that gave more than 5,000 independent businesses a commercial route they could not otherwise access, and can speak directly to what scaled that community and what broke it. Her second act, Holly and Co, is a certified B Corp built around purpose-led small business advice, giving her a live view of what founders are wrestling with now, not a decade ago. As host of Conversations of Inspiration, she has interviewed several hundred founders in long form, which makes her one of the few speakers in the UK with a continuously refreshed sense of what early-stage builders are learning. Her MBE and appointment as a UK Prime Minister’s Business Ambassador give her credibility on the policy side of small business, not only the operator side. She translates founder thinking into language corporate audiences can use: retail teams, marketing teams and transformation teams leave with a sharper sense of what independent brands do that scale players do not. Biography highlights Co-founder of notonthehighstreet.com (2006), the UK marketplace for independent makers. Founder of Holly and Co (2017), a certified B Corporation supporting small businesses. MBE, 2013, for services to small businesses. UK Prime Minister’s Business Ambassador for creative small businesses, 2015. Author of Do What You Love, Love What You Do (Virgin Books, 2021), a Sunday Times bestseller; earlier titles with Simon and Schuster. Presenter of ITV’s Be Your Own Boss and host of the Conversations of Inspiration podcast. Biography Notonthehighstreet.com began as a frustration with nowhere to sell handmade Christmas wreaths. Holly Tucker and Sophie Cornish turned that frustration into the UK’s defining marketplace for independent brands, and over thirteen years it gave more than five thousand small businesses a route to customers they would not otherwise have reached. That is the operator credential Tucker brings into a room. Holly and Co, founded in 2017 and a certified B Corporation since 2022, is where the second chapter sits. It is a platform, a shop and an advice engine for independent founders, and it is the evidence base for most of what Tucker says publicly about small business. The weekly Conversations of Inspiration podcast now runs into the hundreds of episodes, which gives her a continuously updated read on what founders are actually doing, not what commentators think they are doing. Her public role has extended beyond business. An MBE in 2013 for services to small businesses, and appointment as a UK Prime Minister’s Business Ambassador in 2015, placed her inside the conversation about how policy shapes independent enterprise. Three books, including Sunday Times bestseller Do What You Love, Love What You Do, turned that experience into written form for founders at earlier stages. Where Tucker is most useful to a corporate audience is on the question larger companies rarely answer well: what exactly do independent brands do that scale players find hard to replicate, and how should a big business think about that when it partners with them, buys from them, or tries to build its own version. She speaks to that from both sides of the relationship. Key speaking topics Entrepreneurship and the founder mindset Building and scaling marketplaces Independent retail and the creative economy Purpose-led business and B Corp practice Small business advocacy and policy Female founders and enterprise Brand, storytelling and community for consumer businesses Ideal for Retail, consumer and marketplace leadership teams thinking about independent brand partnerships. Marketing and brand leaders who want a grounded view of what small and founder-led brands do that larger ones cannot. Conferences and internal events focused on entrepreneurship, purpose-led growth or the creative economy. Female founder communities and enterprise networks within larger organisations. Audience outcomes A clearer picture of what independent founders actually do differently, drawn from a marketplace of more than five thousand small businesses. A practical read on what purpose-led and B Corp businesses look like in operation, not in theory. Fresh founder stories from a podcast library that now spans several hundred interviews. Language for corporate teams to use when they talk about supporting, partnering with or learning from small businesses. A sharper sense of how policy, platform and community interact in the creative economy.

Why organisations work with Helena Humphrey She is an active senior journalist, not a former one. Her BBC News Washington correspondent role gives her current, direct access to U.S. political decision-making at precisely the moment when those decisions carry the most immediate consequences for global business and investment. Before her broadcast career, she worked inside crises rather than covering them from the outside – serving as IFRC Spokesperson during the West Africa Ebola outbreak and as a UN Risk Communications Officer. That background gives her a practitioner’s understanding of how institutions behave under pressure, which is distinct from what a pure journalist or a geopolitical analyst typically brings. Her career across Deutsche Welle (Washington Correspondent), Euronews (Lead Anchor), NBC News (Global Correspondent), and BBC News gives her a genuinely transatlantic frame on political risk – she understands how events in Washington register in European capitals, and how European political shifts read in Washington. That dual lens is not standard among U.S.-focused political commentators. Fluent in English, French, and German, she can engage with primary sources across multiple political environments without translation – a practical differentiator when the nuances of language and framing carry analytical weight. Her professional specialism is translating fast-moving, multi-country political events into clear, structured narratives for non-specialist audiences. That is not a secondary skill – it is what she does professionally, at broadcast pace, every working day. Biography highlights Anchor and correspondent, BBC News Washington, from 2023 Former Washington Correspondent, Deutsche Welle; former Lead Anchor, Euronews; former Global Correspondent, NBC News IFRC Ebola Response Spokesperson, West Africa, 2014-2015; UN Risk Communications Officer, 2015 BA Joint Honours in French and German, University of Nottingham Moderated international journalism and geopolitics panel at UJANA Annual Conference 2024, alongside author and disinformation analyst Peter Pomerantsev Fluent in English, French, and German; career spanning Europe, Africa, Asia, and the United States Biography A political decision in Washington can reorder global trade relationships within a news cycle. Leadership teams watching the same headlines face the same question: what does this mean for us, and how quickly does it need to drive action? Helena Humphrey works at that intersection daily, as anchor and correspondent for BBC News in Washington D.C. Her broadcast career has taken her through Deutsche Welle as Washington Correspondent, Euronews as Lead Anchor, and NBC News as Global Correspondent, before her current role at BBC News. That trajectory is not simply a list of employers – it has built a frame that moves between American and European perspectives on political risk in a way that neither a purely U.S.-focused analyst nor a European commentator typically achieves. Before her journalism career, Humphrey worked inside major humanitarian crises rather than reporting on them from the outside. She served as IFRC Spokesperson during the West Africa Ebola outbreak and as a UN Risk Communications Officer – managing institutional public information under emergency conditions. That operational experience shapes how she now interprets crisis events for business audiences: she understands how decisions get made inside large institutions when events move faster than plans. Fluent in English, French, and German, and with reporting experience across Europe, Africa, Asia, and the Americas, she offers senior leaders what most geopolitical commentary does not – current access combined with structural depth, and the professional discipline to make it immediately usable. Key speaking topics U.S. politics and global policy implications Geopolitical risk and political uncertainty Transatlantic relations and European political dynamics Crisis communications and institutional decision-making under pressure Global health emergencies and international coordination The information environment, disinformation, and media credibility Ideal for C-suite and board-level leaders with significant U.S. or European political risk exposure Chief Risk Officers and strategic planning teams navigating periods of political volatility Financial and professional services organisations operating across transatlantic markets Global organisations building geopolitical literacy at senior leadership level Audience outcomes A practical framework for distinguishing durable geopolitical shifts from short-term political noise Clearer understanding of how U.S. policy decisions translate into risk and opportunity for global operations Context on how political instability and crisis events affect information flow, and how to make decisions under that uncertainty A transatlantic perspective on political risk that accounts for both American and European dynamics, rather than treating them as separate problems Greater confidence in engaging with geopolitical complexity as a routine part of strategic decision-making, rather than a specialist function

Why organisations work with Helen Skelton A working BBC presenter on Countryfile, Morning Live and Radio 5 Live who hosts, moderates and interviews at broadcast standard, not as a side line. Two Guinness World Records set for Sport Relief, including the longest solo kayak journey down the Amazon, give her a specific credibility on endurance, preparation and fear that rehearsed speakers cannot match. Her 2023 memoir In My Stride, published by Headline, gives audiences a coherent account of resilience drawn from lived experience rather than a framework borrowed from academia. Known across a broad UK audience from Blue Peter, Countryfile and a Strictly Come Dancing final, which makes her a reliable draw for internal conferences, awards nights and customer events. Biography highlights Presenter on BBC One’s Countryfile since 2014 and regular host of BBC Morning Live. Blue Peter presenter from 2008 to 2013, the 33rd in the programme’s history. Two Guinness World Records from the 2,010-mile solo kayak down the Amazon for Sport Relief in 2010. Guinness World Record for the fastest 100 km by kite ski, set on the 2012 South Pole expedition. Runner-up on Strictly Come Dancing series 20 in 2022 with Gorka Marquez. Author of In My Stride: Lessons Learned Through Life and Adventure, Headline, 2023. Biography The Amazon is not a training ground. Helen Skelton kayaked 2,010 miles of it, alone, in 2010 for Sport Relief, taking two Guinness World Records in the process. Two years later she reached the South Pole by a mix of bicycle, skis and kite ski, setting a further record along the way. These are the facts that tend to open any introduction of her, and they are the right place to start, because the speaking work sits on them. The broadcast career gives the speaking a second foundation. She joined Blue Peter in 2008, became the programme’s 33rd presenter, and stayed until 2013. Since 2014 she has presented Countryfile on BBC One, with regular slots on BBC Morning Live and a Sunday show on BBC Radio 5 Live. The polish audiences see on those programmes is what clients hire when she hosts conferences, moderates panels or presents awards. The speaking content draws on all of it. Her 2023 memoir In My Stride, published by Headline, sets out what endurance, preparation and public scrutiny have taught her about resilience, confidence, and the value of time spent outside. She speaks to audiences about the mental work behind physical challenges, the realities of being a working mother in broadcasting, and the mental health benefits of the natural world, a subject she supports through her work with Mind. She reached a Strictly Come Dancing final in 2022 with Gorka Marquez, which brought her to a wider corporate audience and confirmed the profile clients buy when they book her for a room of several hundred people. Key speaking topics Resilience and mental strength Performance under pressure Working motherhood and life-balance Nature, wellbeing and mental health Broadcasting and media craft Adventure and endurance Awards hosting and conference moderation Ideal for Internal conferences, leadership offsites and awards evenings seeking a credible host plus a keynote in one booking. HR, wellbeing and employee engagement programmes focused on resilience, mental health and working parents. Customer and partner events looking for a recognisable broadcaster with a story that travels beyond a single industry. Audience outcomes A direct account of what preparation, fear and repeated setbacks look like at the edges of physical endurance. Practical reflections on resilience and recovery that avoid platitudes, drawn from first-hand experience. A clearer sense of how time outdoors and small daily habits support mental health, grounded in her work with Mind. Confident chairing or hosting that keeps a programme moving and lifts audience energy across a long day.

Why organisations work with Helen Czerski She is an active research physicist inside the climate system, not a commentator on it. Her UCL work on bubbles at the ocean surface sits at the heart of how the atmosphere and ocean exchange heat and carbon, which gives her climate framing a physical basis that reads differently to a board than general sustainability narrative. Blue Machine gives her a defensible thesis audiences can hold onto: the ocean as a single connected engine that drives weather, food, trade and energy. That framing turns abstract climate discussion into something leaders can map to their own exposure. The Institute of Physics awarded her the 2018 Kelvin Medal specifically for translating physics to a mass audience. Few speakers pair that level of academic recognition with a track record on primetime BBC science. She has reached general business and policy audiences as the Wall Street Journal’s “Everyday Physics” columnist and as co-host of BBC Radio 4’s Rare Earth, which means she is used to explaining physics to readers and listeners who did not choose the subject. She treats curiosity as a leadership input. Her Storm in a Teacup thesis, that the rules governing the universe are visible in ordinary objects, lands as a practical argument for how technical organisations should see, question and investigate. Biography highlights Associate Professor, Department of Mechanical Engineering, University College London, leading research on oceanic bubble physics, air-sea gas transfer and bubble acoustics. Natural Sciences (Physics) at Churchill College, Cambridge, followed by a PhD in experimental explosives physics; postdoctoral work at Scripps Institution of Oceanography and URI’s Graduate School of Oceanography. Author of Storm in a Teacup: The Physics of Everyday Life and Blue Machine: How the Ocean Shapes Our World (Penguin / W.W. Norton). 2024 Wainwright Prize for Writing on Conservation for Blue Machine. 2018 William Thomson, Lord Kelvin Medal and Prize from the Institute of Physics for public communication of physics. BBC science presenter across Orbit, Operation Iceberg, Super Senses, Colour: The Spectrum of Science and Sound Waves; co-host of Rare Earth on BBC Radio 4; former “Everyday Physics” columnist at The Wall Street Journal. Biography The ocean is a physical engine that routes most of the planet’s heat, carbon and weather, and it is almost entirely absent from the way boards discuss climate. Helen Czerski’s work at University College London, where she leads research on breaking waves and bubbles at the ocean surface, sits precisely at the interface where that engine does its work. The research is technical. The implications are strategic. Blue Machine, her 2024 Wainwright Prize-winning book, is the public form of that argument. It treats the ocean as one connected system that moves nutrients, ships, storms and carbon, and explains why every industry with a coastline, a fleet or a climate commitment is already inside it. For leaders wrestling with transition plans, physical risk disclosures or supply chain exposure, Czerski offers a vocabulary that is physical rather than political. Her earlier book, Storm in a Teacup, established the method: start with something visible, coffee stains, popcorn, a magnet on a fridge, and work outward to the physics that governs how the world operates. That method earned her the 2018 Kelvin Medal from the Institute of Physics for public communication, and it carried through ten years of primetime BBC science including Orbit, Operation Iceberg and Super Senses, alongside her “Everyday Physics” column at The Wall Street Journal and co-hosting Rare Earth on BBC Radio 4. What she brings into a room is the rare combination of a working research scientist and a public explainer who has spent a decade translating physics for audiences that did not sign up to hear it. For an organisation trying to move from sustainability language to physical reality, that translation is the point. Key speaking topics Ocean physics and the climate system The ocean economy and physical risk Science of the energy transition Everyday physics for decision-makers Curiosity and scientific thinking in organisations Communicating technical complexity to non-technical audiences Ideal for Boards and executive teams setting climate, sustainability or transition strategy Energy, shipping, insurance and infrastructure leaders exposed to ocean and weather systems CTOs, heads of R&D and engineering leaders investing in technical capability Conferences where a serious science keynote needs to land with a mixed commercial audience Audience outcomes A working mental model of the ocean as a single physical system that connects weather, carbon, food and trade A sharper read on where climate and transition narratives rest on solid physics and where they do not Language for talking about physical risk and scientific uncertainty without defaulting to jargon or slogans A renewed case for curiosity as a disciplined practice inside technical and commercial teams

Why organisations work with Georgie Barrat Seven years fronting The Gadget Show built a specific skill, making complex technology feel usable to a general audience, and she brings that directly into boardroom and all-hands settings where AI adoption is stalling. She runs The AI Method, her own programme for helping non-technical users integrate AI into their work, so the keynote is informed by what actually lands with finance, HR and operations staff rather than with engineers. She has hosted on-stage for Google, IBM, Sony, Huawei, Mastercard and BAFTA, which means the moderating craft is tested at the level of audience and panellist that senior events require. Her keynote circuit includes Web Summit, Mobile World Congress and Smart City Expo, the venues where the AI and future-of-work conversation is actually being shaped. She is a credible voice on women in technology and STEM inclusion through sustained work with Stemettes, the IET, Girls in ICT and Childnet, which makes her a natural fit for diversity-led tech events rather than a bolt-on. Biography highlights Presenter of Channel 5’s The Gadget Show for seven years from 2017. Regular contributor to BBC Morning Live and stand-in host for Jeremy Vine on 5. Founder of The AI Method, an AI adoption programme for non-technical users and solopreneurs. Keynote speaker at Web Summit, Mobile World Congress and Smart City Expo. Host and moderator for Google, IBM, Sony, Huawei, Mastercard and BAFTA. First-class degree in English Literature from King’s College London. Biography Most organisations have an AI strategy. Far fewer have a workforce that knows what to do with it. That translation problem, between a tool a leadership team has bought and the person on the payroll expected to use it, is the ground Georgie Barrat has worked for more than a decade. Her training is broadcast. Seven years as a presenter of Channel 5’s The Gadget Show taught her to make complex consumer and enterprise technology legible to a general audience without losing the point. That discipline now runs through her keynotes on AI, digital transformation and the future of work, delivered at Web Summit, Mobile World Congress and Smart City Expo, and at corporate audiences for Google, IBM, Sony, Huawei, Mastercard and BAFTA. Barrat founded The AI Method, a programme designed for women and solopreneurs using AI without a technical background. It gives her keynote material an unusual grounding. She is not theorising about adoption; she is testing what actually moves a non-engineer from curiosity to use. That edge matters for any leader whose AI rollout depends on marketing, finance, HR and operations staff, not data scientists. She is also a sustained advocate for women in tech and STEM inclusion, working with Stemettes, the IET, Girls in ICT and Childnet. On stage she hosts, moderates and keynotes. Off stage she still reports, with regular slots on BBC Morning Live and Jeremy Vine on 5, which keeps the material current rather than curated. Key speaking topics Artificial intelligence and workforce adoption Future of work in an AI-powered organisation Digital transformation and culture change Consumer and enterprise technology trends Women in technology and STEM inclusion Event hosting, moderation and on-stage interviewing Ideal for Leadership teams and all-hands audiences grappling with AI rollout across non-technical functions. CHROs, L&D leads and transformation directors planning workforce upskilling around AI. Tech, telecoms and consumer brands needing a broadcast-grade host or moderator for flagship events. Employee networks and diversity councils building credible women-in-tech programmes. Audience outcomes A clearer picture of where AI creates real productivity gains inside the business versus where the hype is running ahead of the use case. Practical language for leaders to use with non-technical staff so adoption feels less threatening and more achievable. A sharper view of which emerging technologies, from generative AI to spatial computing, warrant attention on a three-year horizon. Evidence-backed framing for women-in-tech and STEM inclusion work that goes beyond celebration days.

Why organisations work with Francesca Martinez She fronted the WOW petition that crossed 100,000 signatures and forced a main-chamber debate in the House of Commons in 2014, which is a concrete democratic outcome rather than an inclusion talking point. Her debut play All Of Us opened at the National Theatre’s Dorfman in 2022 under Ian Rickson, putting disability and welfare politics in front of a mainstream theatre audience, with Francesca shortlisted for the George Devine Award. What the **** Is Normal?! (Virgin Books, Penguin Random House) gives the room a single shared reference point on identity and difference that holds up outside the corporate inclusion vocabulary. She speaks from inside the experience, not about it, which removes the discomfort senior audiences often feel when an external consultant lectures them on disability. She works the room as a stand-up first, which means the message lands in audiences that are sceptical of conventional DEI keynotes. Biography highlights First and only female winner of the Open Mic Award at the Edinburgh Festival (2000), and winner of the Edinburgh Fringe Media Network Award (2011). Author of What the **** Is Normal?! (Virgin Books, Penguin Random House, 2014); Bread and Roses Award runner-up and Chortle Best Comedy Book nominee. Wrote and starred in All of Us, National Theatre (Dorfman), 2022, directed by Ian Rickson; shortlisted for the George Devine Award. Her June 2019 Question Time appearance was called the show’s “best ever moment”, reaching 11 million views in its first week. The first disabled woman to perform on BBC Two’s Live at the Apollo, opening Series 11 in 2015; later featured in the BBC’s Access All Areas special. Fronted the WOW petition and secured a House of Commons main-chamber debate, February 2014. TEDxHousesOfParliament speaker (“Being Happy is a Political Act”) and performer at the World Economic Forum in Davos alongside Emma Thompson. Named to the BBC Radio 4 Woman’s Hour Power List (2014) and awarded two honorary doctorates for work on equality and inclusion. Biography Most inclusion programmes are written in a language that the people they are meant to help do not use. Francesca Martinez calls herself “wobbly”, refuses the medical vocabulary around cerebral palsy, and has spent twenty years showing what happens when someone with a disability narrates their own experience rather than being narrated about. The reframing sounds small. The downstream effect on a room of senior leaders is not. The credentials sit in unusual places for a speaker on this topic. She was the first and only woman to win the Open Mic Award at the Edinburgh Festival, in 2000, and went on to write What the **** Is Normal?!, published by Virgin Books, which was a runner-up for the Bread and Roses Award and a Chortle Best Comedy Book nominee. Her debut play All Of Us, directed by Ian Rickson, opened in the Dorfman at the National Theatre in 2022, and Francesca was shortlisted for the George Devine Award for it. The activism is the part most relevant to senior buyers thinking about substance over messaging. As the public face of the WOW (War on Welfare) campaign, she drove a petition past 100,000 signatures and forced a debate in the main chamber of the House of Commons in 2014, the first time disabled people had secured a main-chamber debate on an agenda of their own choosing. That is a measurable political result, not an inclusion narrative. For an organisation, the value of booking her is specific. Senior audiences hear a writer and performer with mainstream theatrical and broadcast credentials make an argument about identity and belonging that has already been tested in Parliament and at the National Theatre. The conversation that follows tends to be about whether the company’s own inclusion work would survive that kind of scrutiny. Key speaking topics Disability and inclusion at work Identity, difference and self-acceptance Resilience and lived experience Advocacy and the politics of welfare Storytelling as a tool for cultural change Mental health and wellbeing Ideal for CHROs, heads of DEI and ERG sponsors building inclusion programmes that engage sceptical audiences. Leadership offsites and culture events where the goal is to move beyond inclusion language into behaviour change. International Day of Persons with Disabilities, Mental Health Awareness Week and similar moments where credibility of the speaker matters more than topic coverage. Audience outcomes A sharper sense of how disabled and neurodivergent colleagues actually experience the workplace, narrated from the inside. A reference point (the book, the play, the WOW campaign) the audience can carry back into their own inclusion conversations. Permission to question the corporate vocabulary of inclusion without abandoning the work. A break from the standard motivational register; the room laughs first and then commits.

Why organisations work with Fiona Armstrong Forty years of live broadcast experience means autocue, running-order changes and long awards formats hold no surprise. Organisers typically notice that reliability only after being burned by the alternative. Former ITN newscaster on News at Ten and News at 5:40, giving her automatic standing in front of senior business audiences who still recognise a national news face. As His Majesty’s Lord-Lieutenant of Dumfries, the King’s personal representative in the region, she brings genuine ceremonial weight to awards evenings, civic occasions and royal-linked events. Former foreign correspondent who has reported from Uganda on AIDS orphans, Cambodia on landmine clearance and West Africa with the Mercy Ships, able to moderate panels on international development from direct field experience rather than briefing notes. Holds a history doctorate from the University of Strathclyde and an honorary doctorate from the University of Glasgow, which suits academic, cultural and heritage hosting roles where a celebrity presenter would feel out of place. Biography highlights Former ITN national newscaster, presenter of News at Ten and News at 5:45/5:40; launch team on GMTV. Presenter on the BBC News Channel from 2010; current presenter of Border Life and Lookaround for ITV Border. Outstanding Contribution award, Royal Television Society North East and Border Awards, 2017. His Majesty’s Lord-Lieutenant of Dumfries since 2016; royal representative across Nithsdale, Annandale and Eskdale. Honorary Doctorate, University of Glasgow; Honorary Fellowship, University of Cumbria; board member, University of Central Lancashire. Past President of the Royal Highland and Agricultural Society of Scotland; Chairwoman of the Clan Armstrong Trust; author of two fishing books and two cookbooks. Biography A long awards ceremony is one of the least forgiving stages in corporate life. Twenty prizes, tight timings, a room that cooled off an hour ago, and a single person at the lectern expected to keep it moving. Fiona Armstrong has hosted enough of them to know why organisers come back. She spent the late 1980s and early 1990s at ITN, presenting News at Ten and the 5:40 bulletin when those programmes still set the national news agenda. She covered the Lockerbie air disaster and filed a series on AIDS orphans from Uganda. Later assignments took her to Cambodia for landmine clearance and to West Africa with the Mercy Ships. The BBC News Channel brought her back as a network presenter in 2010; ITV Border has retained her in current affairs through Lookaround and Border Life. The Royal Television Society North East and Border gave her its Outstanding Contribution award in 2017, recognising a career closely associated with Border Television. The University of Glasgow has granted her an honorary doctorate; the University of Cumbria elected her an honorary fellow in 2018. She has served as His Majesty’s Lord-Lieutenant of Dumfries since 2016, representing the Crown across Nithsdale, Annandale and Eskdale. Alongside the newsroom work, she has written two fishing books, two cookbooks, and more than twenty films on Scottish clan history. She chairs the Clan Armstrong Trust, was President of the Royal Highland Show in 2020, and sits on the board of the University of Central Lancashire. Corporate clients typically book her to host awards evenings or moderate senior panels. Specialist subject matter, from international reporting to Scottish heritage and rural affairs, is available when a brief calls for it. Key speaking topics Event hosting and awards presentation Panel moderation and conference chairing Broadcast journalism and live news presentation International humanitarian and field reporting Scottish clan history and Borders heritage Civic leadership and royal representation Fly-fishing and rural life Ideal for Corporate awards organisers and event leads booking an experienced on-stage host Conference chairs and event directors are hiring a senior-panel moderator Civic, heritage and ceremonial occasions requiring a royal representative or recognised public service figure Cultural, agricultural and rural-sector organisations in Scotland and the Borders region Audience outcomes An evening kept on schedule, with prize categories moved at pace and all sponsors and winners given their due on stage. Panel conversations that stay on the brief, with questions that push participants past prepared answers without derailing the session. Inside accounts of covering major international stories, including Lockerbie, AIDS orphans in Africa and landmine clearance in Cambodia. Context on Scottish cultural life and clan history delivered with the specificity of a working historian, not a celebrity interest.