Storytelling & Business Communication speakers

Why organisations work with Matt Eversmann He brings a first-person, documented account of small-unit leadership inside the Battle of Mogadishu, one of the most analysed combat actions of the modern era, and translates it directly into commercial decision-making. His Bronze Star with Valor and 20 years in elite Ranger and Infantry units give credibility on team performance under stress that consulting frameworks cannot replicate. As co-author with James Patterson of three New York Times bestselling oral histories of soldiers and police officers, he has spent a decade interviewing operators about how teams hold together, which sharpens his content well beyond a single war story. His teaching record at the U.S. Army War College and the Johns Hopkins ROTC program means he speaks to leaders in the language of training and followership, not just battlefield anecdotes. He is the rare keynote a senior team will quote back to each other a week later, because the material concerns specific, named decisions, not abstractions about resilience. Biography highlights Retired U.S. Army First Sergeant, 3rd Battalion, 75th Ranger Regiment; 20 years of active service. Bronze Star Medal with Valor device for actions in the Battle of Mogadishu, October 3, 1993. Portrayed by Josh Hartnett in Ridley Scott’s Black Hawk Down (2001); the first source interviewed for Mark Bowden’s original book. Co-author with James Patterson of Walk in My Combat Boots, Walk the Blue Line and American Heroes, all New York Times bestsellers in the Heroes Among Us series. Former Operations Sergeant at the U.S. Army War College and former instructor in Johns Hopkins University’s ROTC program. Deployed to Iraq from 2007 to 2008 as an Infantry Company First Sergeant with the 10th Mountain Division during the Surge. Biography The Battle of Mogadishu on 3 October 1993 lasted roughly 18 hours. Inside it, a young staff sergeant from the 3rd Ranger Battalion was responsible for a chalk of soldiers fast-roping into a city that had already gone wrong. That sergeant was Matt Eversmann, and the decisions he made in those hours became one of the most studied case studies in modern small-unit command. The reason that experience matters in a boardroom is not symbolism. It is that the conditions Rangers train for, incomplete information, broken communications, no time to consult upward, are the same conditions senior teams now face during cyber incidents, supply shocks and reputational crises. Eversmann teaches what holds and what fails when a plan does not survive contact. His authority on the subject extends well beyond his own service. As co-author with James Patterson of Walk in My Combat Boots, Walk the Blue Line and American Heroes, he has spent years interviewing soldiers, police officers and first responders about the texture of decisions made under load. That body of work, three New York Times bestsellers, sits behind every keynote. Before founding Eversmann Advisory in 2018, he served as Operations Sergeant at the U.S. Army War College, taught leadership in the Johns Hopkins University ROTC program, and led an Infantry Company through the Iraq Surge. The result is a speaker who can move from a specific named moment in Mogadishu to a specific question a CEO is asking about command culture, without losing either audience. Key speaking topics Leadership under pressure and in crisis Team performance in high-stakes environments Decision-making with incomplete information Accountability and followership inside elite units Trust and culture in small teams Lessons from the Battle of Mogadishu and combat command Service, sacrifice and operator stories from Walk in My Combat Boots Ideal for CEO and C-suite offsites focused on resilience, command culture and crisis decision-making. Leadership development programmes for senior operators, plant managers, regional heads and first-line commanders of large field organisations. Conferences for sectors with a high-consequence operating tempo: financial services, energy, healthcare, defence, law enforcement, and aviation. Annual sales kick-offs and partner meetings looking for a serious anchor keynote rather than entertainment. Audience outcomes A vocabulary for naming what their teams actually do well and badly when conditions go non-linear. Specific lessons from a documented combat action that translate to crisis governance and post-incident review. A clearer view of what accountability looks like at the team-leader level, distinct from individual performance. Renewed seriousness about preparation, rehearsal and standards as cultural artefacts, not HR processes. Stories with named operators and named events that senior leaders can reference back inside their own organisations.

Why organisations work with Matt Haig A first-person account of severe depression and suicidal crisis that has shaped public mental health conversation in the UK, told by someone whose books on the subject have topped national bestseller charts. A literary platform of unusual scale: The Midnight Library alone has sold over ten million copies and won the 2020 Goodreads Choice Award for Fiction, which means his name lands with employees and leaders before he opens his mouth. Notes on a Nervous Planet gives him a developed argument about anxiety and the digital environment that maps directly onto how work now feels for most knowledge workers. He sits outside the clinical and HR registers that dominate workplace wellbeing content. The voice is a working writer’s, which is why audiences listen rather than tolerate. Biography highlights Author of Reasons to Stay Alive, a number one Sunday Times bestseller that spent 46 weeks in the UK top 10 and won the 2016 Books Are My Bag Readers’ Award for Non-Fiction. Author of The Midnight Library, winner of the 2020 Goodreads Choice Award for Fiction and a New York Times bestseller with more than ten million copies sold worldwide. Author of the Sunday Times number one bestseller Notes on a Nervous Planet, on anxiety, social media, and modern life. Novelist whose adult fiction includes The Humans, How to Stop Time, The Radleys, The Comfort Book, and The Life Impossible. Children’s author whose Shadow Forest won the Nestle Smarties Book Prize Gold Award and whose A Boy Called Christmas was adapted into a feature film with Maggie Smith, Jim Broadbent, Sally Hawkins, and Kristen Wiig. Translated into more than fifty languages, with a public platform on mental health that reaches well beyond the literary audience. Biography The honest conversation about anxiety and depression inside organisations is harder than the policy version. Most employees have read the wellbeing email. Far fewer have heard a senior voice describe what panic actually feels like at three in the morning, or why the always-on environment makes recovery slower than it should be. That is the gap Matt Haig’s writing has been filling for a decade. Reasons to Stay Alive, his memoir of a near-fatal breakdown at twenty-four, was a number one Sunday Times bestseller and stayed in the UK top ten for forty-six weeks. It won the 2016 Books Are My Bag Readers’ Award for Non-Fiction and changed how a generation of British readers spoke about depression. Notes on a Nervous Planet followed in 2018 with a sharper argument: that the texture of modern life, especially digital life, is a major part of why so many people feel ill. Both books are short, plain, and unguarded, which is why they have travelled. Alongside the memoirs is a serious fiction career. The Midnight Library won the 2020 Goodreads Choice Award for Fiction, became an instant New York Times bestseller, and has sold over ten million copies worldwide. The Humans, How to Stop Time, The Radleys, The Comfort Book, and The Life Impossible sit alongside it. Children’s titles include Shadow Forest, a Nestle Smarties Gold winner, and A Boy Called Christmas, adapted in 2021 into a feature film with Maggie Smith, Jim Broadbent, Sally Hawkins, and Kristen Wiig. For organisations, the value is straightforward. Haig is not a clinician and does not pretend to be. He is a working writer with a global readership who has thought longer and more publicly about anxiety, depression, and modern overload than almost any non-specialist alive. Audiences listen because he has earned the subject, and because the language is recognisably his own. Key speaking topics Mental health in the workplace Depression and anxiety in modern life Digital overload and always-on culture Resilience and recovery Storytelling and the language of wellbeing Creativity under pressure Ideal for CHROs and heads of wellbeing programming a serious-register keynote on mental health. Internal events tied to World Mental Health Day, Mental Health Awareness Week, or wider EVP and culture moments. Leadership offsites where the brief is to model open conversation about anxiety, burnout, and pressure rather than to brief on policy. Employee audiences in high-intensity sectors (finance, professional services, media, tech) where always-on working is part of the culture. Audience outcomes A first-person account of severe depression and recovery that gives employees permission to talk about their own experience. A clearer argument for why digital life and modern work conditions amplify anxiety, drawn from Notes on a Nervous Planet. Practical anchors for managing low moods, panic, and the social media environment, in language that does not sound like a wellness pamphlet. A reminder, useful for leaders, that the most credible communications about mental health do not sound like communications. Permission to treat mental health as a normal subject of adult conversation rather than a compliance topic.

Why organisations work with Matt Le Tissier He spent his entire 16-year professional career at Southampton, scoring 209 goals in 540 appearances, which gives any session on loyalty and culture a rare lived foundation rather than a borrowed example. He was the first midfielder to reach 100 Premier League goals and converted 47 of 48 career penalties, both records that travel well in front of audiences who recognise top-flight football. He was voted greatest Premier League player ever in a 2020 Eurosport poll, which gives him the sort of standing in the UK market that makes him a draw for hospitality, client events, and after-dinner bookings. He spent close to two decades as a Sky Sports Soccer Saturday panellist, so the broadcasting craft, anecdote pacing, and ease in front of a room are already there. His autobiography Taking Le Tiss, published by HarperSport, gives the personal narrative a clear public form to draw on for keynote and Q&A material. Biography highlights One-club career at Southampton, 1986 to 2002: 209 goals in 540 appearances. First midfielder to score 100 Premier League goals; 100 goals and 64 assists in 270 Premier League appearances. PFA Young Player of the Year, 1989-90. Eight England caps, 1994 to 1997. Career penalty record of 47 from 48. Voted greatest Premier League player ever in a 2020 Eurosport poll. Long-running Sky Sports Soccer Saturday panellist until August 2020; subject of Sky Sports’ Le God: The Matt Le Tissier Story. Author of Taking Le Tiss, HarperSport, 2009. Biography Southampton signed Matt Le Tissier in 1986 and never let him go. He spent sixteen years at the club, scored 209 goals in 540 appearances, and finished his career as their second-highest scorer in history. In an era when most top players moved for bigger clubs and bigger contracts, that career stands out on its own. The Premier League records do most of the talking. Le Tissier was the first midfielder to reach 100 Premier League goals, with 64 assists alongside them, and his career penalty record of 47 from 48 is still cited as the strongest in English top-flight football. The PFA Young Player of the Year award in 1989-90 marked him out early, and the 2020 Eurosport poll naming him greatest Premier League player ever gave a generation of fans a chance to make the case again, two decades after he retired. For corporate audiences, the value is in what one career at one club teaches about sticking with an institution through change, relegation fights, and quieter seasons. He played under multiple managers, refused several moves, and stayed visible in the public eye long after retirement. After his playing career he spent close to two decades as a Sky Sports Soccer Saturday panellist, which sharpened the storytelling and the timing that an after-dinner audience or a moderated panel needs. His autobiography Taking Le Tiss, published by HarperSport in 2009, set out the career in his own voice. Sky Sports’ Le God: The Matt Le Tissier Story, made about a player who never left, gives any room he speaks in an immediate point of reference: a one-club Premier League career, on his own terms, in a southern English town that adopted him as its own. Key speaking topics Loyalty and the one-club career Pressure and composure in front of goal Sustained performance across a long sporting career Premier League history and analysis Life as a broadcaster after elite sport After-dinner storytelling Ideal for Hospitality, client entertainment, and brand activation events in the UK where a recognisable Premier League figure is a draw. After-dinner and awards bookings for sales teams, partner events, and incentive nights. Panel guest or moderated Q&A formats at sports business, fan engagement, and football industry events. Senior leadership off-sites and sales conferences where loyalty and long-career discipline are part of the agenda. Audience outcomes A first-hand account of what it takes to commit to one organisation across sixteen years of changing leadership. A grounded view of pressure moments, including penalty taking and high-stakes decisions, from someone with the records to back it up. Stories from the Premier League’s first decade told by a player who lived it and then spent two decades broadcasting it. A sharper sense of what life looks like for an elite performer when the playing career ends and the public role continues.

Why organisations work with Matthew Amroliwala A working chair, not a celebrity name on the agenda. He runs panels the way he runs a live news hour, with structure, pace and a clean line of questioning. Three decades of BBC reporting across Northern Ireland, Bosnia, Westminster, Washington and New York gives him an instinct for how to land questions on senior political and corporate figures without the room going flat. Anchors Global on BBC World News, the BBC’s flagship international news programme, daily since 2014. He brings the same register to conference stages. Equally comfortable on a black-tie awards stage, a CEO fireside, and a multi-stakeholder policy panel. The audience reads him as the BBC, which sets a useful tone of seriousness from the first minute. Biography highlights Chief presenter on the BBC News Channel since April 2023. Presenter of Global on BBC World News, the BBC’s international news flagship, since 8 September 2014. Presenter of World News Today across BBC World News and BBC Four since 27 June 2016. Co-presented Crimewatch with Kirsty Young, January 2008 to March 2015. Eight years as a BBC news, political and foreign correspondent reporting from Northern Ireland, Bosnia, Westminster, Washington and New York. Read Law and Politics at Durham University; joined the BBC in 1989. Biography The chair is the variable that decides whether a panel earns the room or wastes it. Matthew Amroliwala has spent more than three decades inside the BBC operating on exactly that variable, first as a correspondent, then as a presenter on UK rolling news for sixteen years, and since 2014 as the anchor of Global on BBC World News. The reporting years are the foundation. He covered the run-up to the Northern Ireland ceasefires, reported from Bosnia during the Balkans conflict, and worked Westminster, Washington and New York on political and foreign assignments. Live news at that level teaches a specific discipline: how to keep a senior figure honest in real time, how to shape a conversation on the clock, how to read a room without losing the line of questioning. That discipline is what conference and event organisers commission. Amroliwala chairs panels and hosts awards where the brief calls for a credible BBC voice on international affairs and a presenter who can hold the structure when a session over-runs or a speaker drifts. He has co-presented Crimewatch with Kirsty Young, presents World News Today across BBC World News and BBC Four, and was promoted to chief presenter on the BBC News Channel in April 2023. For senior audiences, the value is unambiguous. He is the BBC in the room, which sets the tone. He has interviewed the kind of figures the audience expects to hear pressed. And he treats the chair as a working role rather than a ceremonial one. Key speaking topics Conference chairing and moderation Panel facilitation on geopolitics and global affairs Awards hosting and emceeing Fireside interviews with senior leaders International news and current affairs Live broadcast hosting for corporate events Ideal for Conferences and summits on global affairs, geopolitics or international business needing a credible chair Corporate awards ceremonies and gala dinners CEO and leadership fireside conversations where the interviewer needs to press without antagonising Multi-stakeholder policy panels with senior political, regulatory or corporate figures Audience outcomes A panel that surfaces the questions the audience actually came for, not the ones the speakers came prepared to answer. A coherent agenda held to time, with transitions that read as editorial judgement rather than logistics. Senior speakers handled with the register and discipline of live BBC interviewing. An evening or session that lands with the seriousness of a BBC broadcast, not a hosted entertainment slot.

Why organisations work with Matthew Luhn He spent more than 20 years inside Pixar’s story room, working on Toy Story, Monsters Inc., Finding Nemo, Up and Ratatouille, so the principles he teaches are the ones that actually shipped some of the most commercially successful films ever made. His book The Best Story Wins (Morgan James, 2018) gives buyers a named, documented methodology, not a generic storytelling pitch. Teams leave with a structure they can apply to a keynote, a sales call, or a brand campaign. He is one of very few speakers who has been inside a working creative culture at scale, and can speak credibly to how Pixar’s Braintrust process produces honest creative feedback without breaking trust. His client list on this material includes Apple, Google, Microsoft, Salesforce, Capital One, Procter and Gamble, Sony and Target, which signals that senior brand, marketing and innovation leaders are the audience he is built for. He treats storytelling as a commercial competency, not a soft skill. The work is aimed at sharper messaging, stronger brand recall, and better internal communication of strategy. Biography highlights Story artist and story supervisor at Pixar Animation Studios across more than two decades, with credits on Toy Story 2, Monsters Inc., Finding Nemo, Cars, Ratatouille, Up, Toy Story 3 and Monsters University. One of the original 12 animators hired on the first Toy Story film in 1995. Youngest animator hired on The Simpsons at age 19, with credits on six 1992 episodes including Kamp Krusty and Lisa’s Pony. Author of The Best Story Wins: How to Leverage Hollywood Storytelling in Business and Beyond, Morgan James Publishing, 2018. TEDx speaker (TEDxUCSB), and corporate keynote speaker for Apple, Google, Microsoft, Salesforce, Capital One, Procter and Gamble, Sony, Target, Vrbo, Adidas and Lego. Trained at the California Institute of the Arts character animation program; BFA from the Academy of Art University. Biography Pixar built one of the most reliable creative engines in modern business by treating story as a discipline, not a talent. Inside that engine sat a small group of story artists whose job was to find, in every film, the emotional truth a global audience would respond to. Matthew Luhn was one of them, across more than 20 years and films including Toy Story, Monsters Inc., Finding Nemo, Up and Ratatouille. That work began early. He was the youngest animator hired on The Simpsons at 19, then joined Pixar in 1995 as one of the first 12 animators on Toy Story. He moved into the story room for Toy Story 2 and stayed there, eventually as story supervisor, through some of the most commercially successful animated films ever made. The carry-over to business is direct. The same questions a story artist asks about a film, what does the audience need to feel, what is the change, what is the one thing they should remember, are the questions a leader should be asking about a strategy launch, a sales pitch or a brand campaign. His book, The Best Story Wins (Morgan James, 2018), turns those questions into a working methodology. Buyers tend to find him through a specific tension. Their messages are accurate but not memorable. Their brand is recognised but not loved. Their internal communications inform but do not move people. Apple, Google, Microsoft, Salesforce, Capital One, Procter and Gamble, Sony and Target have used his work to address those gaps. Key speaking topics Business storytelling Brand narrative and customer engagement Creative culture and the Pixar Braintrust process Innovation and creative differentiation Leadership communication Sales and pitch storytelling Ideal for CMOs, brand directors and content leaders rebuilding how the company shows up to customers. Innovation leads and product organisations that need to make new ideas land internally and externally. Sales leadership and revenue teams sharpening pitch craft and customer-facing narrative. Internal communications and HR leaders running large town halls, change programmes or culture launches. Audience outcomes A working structure for building a story around any business message, drawn from the Pixar story process. Sharper sense of what makes a brand or product narrative memorable rather than merely accurate. Tools for giving and receiving honest creative feedback, modelled on the Pixar Braintrust. A clearer separation between information delivery and persuasion, applied to keynotes, pitches and internal comms. Specific, repeatable techniques the team can apply to the next campaign, all-hands or customer presentation.

Why organisations work with Michael Brenner His core argument; that empathy outperforms authority as both a marketing and a leadership lever, is grounded in practitioner experience inside SAP and NewsCred, not academic research; senior leaders engage with it as a claim someone has actually lived, not theorised His book Mean People Suck gives CMOs and CHROs a shared language for the link between culture, employee engagement, and revenue outcomes, making it useful in conversations that usually stay siloed The “Champion Leader” model is a named, transferable alternative to command-and-control management: specific enough to teach, tested across both large enterprises and early-stage startups His content marketing work is anchored in a measurable ROI framework from The Content Formula, translating content investment into financial terms for leaders who need to justify budgets to the CFO, not just the marketing team He has operated on both sides of the client-agency relationship, which means his diagnosis of where organisations waste marketing spend carries a credibility most single-perspective speakers cannot match Biography highlights CEO and Founder of Marketing Insider Group, a content marketing agency serving Fortune 500 brands and B2B technology companies Former VP of Global Content Marketing Strategy at SAP and Head of Strategy at NewsCred Author of three books: Mean People Suck: How Empathy Leads to Bigger Profits and a Better Life (2019), The Content Formula, and Digital Marketing Growth Hacks Named Top CMO Influencer by Forbes and Top Business Speaker by The Huffington Post Contributor to Forbes, The Economist, and The Guardian; contributor at Content Marketing Institute Featured in Entrepreneur Magazine; facilitated content strategy workshops for MarketingProfs Biography Most organisations treat their marketing problem as a content problem. The more accurate diagnosis is a leadership one: companies default to self-promotion when their customers need help, and they build management cultures that reward compliance when growth requires empathy. Michael Brenner spent two decades working from the inside of that tension – as VP of Global Content Marketing Strategy at SAP, as Head of Strategy at NewsCred, and as CMO across a series of high-growth technology startups. His 2019 book Mean People Suck: How Empathy Leads to Bigger Profits and a Better Life argues that low employee engagement and weak marketing performance share a common root: a leadership culture that has traded empathy for authority. The research and case evidence he assembles make it a commercial argument, not a motivational one. As founder and CEO of Marketing Insider Group, Brenner has built content marketing programmes for more than 75 brands. His earlier book, The Content Formula, provides a practical ROI framework that converts content investment into financial language – useful for marketing leaders who need to make the commercial case to a CFO, not just a brand committee. His keynote work is structured around two named concepts: the “Champion Leader,” a model for leaders who close the gap between what organisations ask their teams to do and what actually drives results; and the “Bullseye Organisation,” which frames customer-centricity as a structural discipline rather than a values statement. A contributor to Forbes, The Economist, and The Guardian, and named Top CMO Influencer by Forbes and Top Business Speaker by The Huffington Post, Brenner speaks across the United States and Europe, primarily to senior marketing, commercial, and leadership audiences. Key speaking topics Customer-centric marketing strategy Content marketing ROI and measurement Empathy-led leadership Employee engagement and culture The Champion Leader model Organisational alignment around the customer B2B marketing and demand generation Ideal for CMOs and marketing directors seeking a measurable framework for content marketing investment CHROs and culture leads addressing the connection between employee engagement and commercial performance CEOs and senior leadership teams weighing the limits of authority-based management B2B technology and SaaS organisations building customer-first marketing and go-to-market capabilities Audience outcomes A practitioner-built argument for why empathy is a commercial lever, with specific cases and research rather than aspiration The “Champion Leader” framework as a named, teachable model for shifting from directive to customer-oriented leadership A measurable ROI methodology for content marketing that can be used in internal budget and investment conversations A practical method for identifying where self-promotional bias is costing the business in audience reach and revenue Clearer criteria for distinguishing marketing that serves the customer from marketing that serves the organisation’s ego

Why organisations work with Michael Maisey Lived experience that lands in rooms where wellbeing decks usually do not, drawn from five years in Feltham Young Offenders Institute and a documented twenty-year rebuild. Operates an active service organisation. The CIP Project runs residential workshops from a 25-acre Devon retreat centre, giving him a working view of what actually helps people recover, not a theoretical one. Two published works that hold up to corporate scrutiny: Young Offender (Pan Macmillan, 2019) and Change is Possible: The Seven Stages to Healing Trauma (2025). The second gives him a named framework, not just a story. Civic recognition by the London Borough of Hounslow and the Metropolitan Police in 2014, a useful third-party validation when buyers vet speakers with criminal-record backgrounds. Talks designed to give managers practical language for the empathy-and-communication conversation, rather than a motivational arc that leaves the audience moved but unequipped. Biography highlights Founder of The CIP Project, a UK non-profit operating from a 25-acre retreat centre in Devon. Author of Young Offender: My Life from Armed Robber to Local Hero, published by Pan Macmillan in 2019. Author of Change is Possible: The Seven Stages to Healing Trauma, published in 2025. TEDx speaker. Talk title: “The Healing Power of Connection”. Honoured by the London Borough of Hounslow and the Metropolitan Police in 2014 for services to the community. Over 17 years sober. Public advocacy work across UK prisons, including author visits to HMYOI Aylesbury. Biography Most corporate wellbeing programmes do not fail on intent. They fail on permission. Employees are offered resources, apps and policies, but rarely the model of what an honest conversation about mental health, addiction or trauma actually sounds like in a working environment. Michael Maisey’s contribution is to provide that model in a room of senior managers, with credibility earned outside the wellness industry. His route into the work is unusually direct. At sixteen he was sentenced for armed robbery and spent much of his teenage years in Feltham Young Offenders Institute. The rebuild that followed produced two things organisations care about: a published autobiography with Pan Macmillan, Young Offender, in 2019; and a working non-profit, The CIP Project, founded in 2018 on a 25-acre site in Devon, supporting people with addiction, mental health, PTSD and childhood trauma. A second book, Change is Possible: The Seven Stages to Healing Trauma, followed in 2025 and gives him a structured framework rather than a single biographical story. His TEDx talk, “The Healing Power of Connection”, is the most-quoted piece of his keynote content in workplace settings. In 2014, the London Borough of Hounslow and the Metropolitan Police recognised him formally for services to the community. For a head of people or culture, the practical value is twofold. Maisey can hold a room on the subjects that most speakers either soften or skirt: suicidal ideation, addiction, the texture of trauma. And he can hand managers a vocabulary for the empathy-and-communication conversation that has otherwise sat in the wellbeing policy and never made it onto the floor. Key speaking topics Workplace mental health Empathy and compassion at work Trauma recovery Addiction and the workplace Personal transformation and lived experience Communication around wellbeing Ideal for CHROs, heads of people, heads of culture and wellbeing leads commissioning workplace mental health content Internal manager populations responsible for direct conversations about wellbeing Employee resource groups and DEI forums focused on mental health and recovery Conference programmes seeking a lived-experience anchor on wellbeing alongside clinical or academic speakers Audience outcomes Sharper language for raising mental health, addiction or trauma in a workplace conversation without making it clinical A more concrete view of what recovery actually requires, drawn from operating a residential support model Permission, observed in the room, for senior people to speak honestly about their own experience A framework, drawn from the seven stages in Change is Possible, for thinking about trauma in stages rather than as a single event

Why organisations work with Michael Owen A first-hand account of operating at the top of a global sport from the age of 17, with the goalscoring record at Liverpool, Real Madrid, Newcastle, Manchester United and England to back it. One of only nine Englishmen to win the Ballon d’Or, and the most recent, which gives any audience an unusually direct line to what world-class performance actually requires day to day. A second career built deliberately rather than by accident: Manor House Stables in Cheshire, founded with Andrew Black in 2007, has become a working thoroughbred yard now training under Hugo Palmer. Active broadcast presence with TNT Sports and Amazon Prime Video Premier League coverage, which keeps the perspective current rather than retrospective. Author of Reboot: My Life, My Time (2019), a candid account of injuries, scrutiny and the transition out of professional sport that gives an after-dinner or Q and A session real substance. Biography highlights 2001 Ballon d’Or winner, the first English recipient since Kevin Keegan in 1979. 89 England caps, 40 international goals; sixth on England’s all-time scoring list at retirement. Named in Pele’s FIFA 100 list of the greatest living players in 2004. Career clubs: Liverpool, Real Madrid, Newcastle United, Manchester United, Stoke City. Author of Off the Record (2004) and Reboot: My Life, My Time (Reach Sport, 2019). Co-founder of Manor House Stables, Cheshire; pundit for TNT Sports and Amazon Prime Video. Biography Liverpool were 1-0 down to Arsenal in the 2001 FA Cup final when Michael Owen scored twice in the last eight minutes to win the trophy. That season he helped Liverpool to a treble of the FA Cup, League Cup and UEFA Cup, and in December he was named European Footballer of the Year. He was 22, and the most recent English winner of the Ballon d’Or to this day. The career around that moment is the substance of his speaking. A debut at Liverpool at 17, a Premier League Golden Boot in his first full season, 89 England caps, 40 international goals, and spells at Real Madrid, Newcastle, Manchester United and Stoke. Pele included him in the FIFA 100 list of the greatest living players. The lived experience underneath those numbers, including injury, scrutiny and the discipline of staying selectable across four major tournaments for England, is what audiences buy when they book him. Life after football has been built deliberately. In 2007 he and the entrepreneur Andrew Black converted a cattle barn in Cheshire into Manor House Stables, now a Classic-winning operation with Hugo Palmer as resident trainer and a racing club that opens ownership to a broader audience. He works as a pundit for TNT Sports and Amazon Prime Video, with regular Premier League coverage. His 2019 autobiography Reboot: My Life, My Time is a frank account of what playing through pain, public criticism and the end of a top-level career actually felt like. For corporate audiences the value is direct testimony rather than a framework. Owen speaks to what it takes to perform under sustained pressure, how to keep going when the body and the press are against you, and how to construct a second act on purpose rather than by drift. That makes him a strong fit for after-dinner formats, leadership offsites with a sports lens, and brand-ambassador work where credibility and recognition matter as much as content. Key speaking topics Performance under pressure Lessons from elite sport for business leaders Resilience through injury and setback Transition from professional sport to entrepreneurship Building a second career: Manor House Stables and racing Football punditry and the modern Premier League Ideal for After-dinner audiences at corporate events, partner conferences and client hospitality Sales, leadership and high-performance offsites that want a credible sporting voice Brand and sponsorship activations where a recognisable name is part of the value Q and A and fireside formats with a host who can draw out career stories Audience outcomes A direct account of what world-class performance demands across a 17-year career Specific stories about Liverpool, Real Madrid, Manchester United and England rather than generalised lessons A candid view on injury, scrutiny and the pressure of being the youngest player in the room A working example of building a second career on purpose, through racing, broadcasting and writing

Why organisations work with Michael Portillo He has held three Cabinet posts, including the Treasury and Defence briefs, and can describe how spending decisions, security policy, and party-political pressure intersect from inside the room. He brings 25 years of close observation of Westminster as a broadcaster on The Moral Maze, This Week with Andrew Neil, and his GB News weekend programme, which keeps his political reading current rather than historical. He carries one of the most recognisable names and voices in British public life through Great British Railway Journeys and its international spin-offs, which gives a corporate event genuine cultural weight. He has served on the BAE Systems board and the International Commission on Missing Persons, so he can speak to defence industry dynamics and post-conflict governance with first-hand reference points. He chairs panels and prize juries from the Man Booker to UK arts endowments, which makes him an effective moderator and after-dinner host as well as a keynote voice. Biography highlights Cabinet Minister under John Major: Chief Secretary to the Treasury, Secretary of State for Employment, Secretary of State for Defence. MP for Enfield Southgate (1984-1997) and Kensington and Chelsea (1999-2005); Shadow Chancellor of the Exchequer (2000-2001). Presenter of Great British Railway Journeys and its Continental, American, Indian, Asian, Australian, Alaskan and Canadian, and Coastal series for the BBC since 2010. Long-running panellist on BBC Radio 4’s The Moral Maze; Conservative voice on BBC’s This Week with Andrew Neil from 2003 to 2019. Non-executive director of BAE Systems (2002-2006); Commissioner of the International Commission on Missing Persons since 1998; President of DEBRA. First-class degree in history from Peterhouse, Cambridge; author of Portillo’s Hidden History of Britain and the Railway Journeys books with Michael O’Mara. Biography The 1997 general election produced the most quoted result in modern British political history. Stephen Twigg unseated Michael Portillo in Enfield Southgate with a 17.4% swing, and the “Portillo moment” entered the language. What is less remembered is that Portillo had, by that point, already run the Treasury’s spending side, the Employment department, and the Ministry of Defence, all before turning forty-five. That CV gives him an unusual vantage on how British government actually works. As Chief Secretary to the Treasury he ran the public spending negotiations that set Whitehall priorities. As Defence Secretary in the mid-1990s he handled procurement, NATO posture, and the Bosnia and Northern Ireland files. As Shadow Chancellor under William Hague he saw the modern Conservative Party’s internal debates from the inside. A broadcaster’s career followed Parliament rather than a corporate one. He has been a regular on BBC Radio 4’s The Moral Maze for over two decades, was the Conservative seat on This Week with Andrew Neil for its full 16-year run, and now hosts a weekend politics show on GB News. The Great British Railway Journeys franchise, in eight country variants since 2010, made him one of the BBC’s most recognisable presenters. The combination matters for a corporate audience. Portillo can talk about UK fiscal pressure with reference to the spending review process he once ran, about defence and procurement with reference to a Cabinet brief and a BAE Systems boardroom, and about how political risk feels day to day from inside a 25-year broadcasting beat. He chaired the 2008 Man Booker Prize, sits as President of the DEBRA charity, and served as a Commissioner of the International Commission on Missing Persons. He is, in practice, a senior public figure with a working knowledge of how British and European institutions hold together under stress. Key speaking topics UK politics and Westminster decision-making Public spending, the Treasury, and fiscal pressure Defence policy and the UK’s security posture Party leadership and political risk European and Anglo-Spanish relations British media, broadcasting, and public life After-dinner political commentary Ideal for Boards and executive teams looking for an informed read on UK political and fiscal risk Financial services, defence, and public-affairs audiences planning against shifting government priorities Senior client and partner dinners where a recognisable broadcaster as host or speaker adds weight Conferences requiring a political moderator or panel chair with Cabinet-level reference points Audience outcomes A clearer view of how decisions inside the UK Treasury and Cabinet actually get made A current reading of the political pressures shaping spending, regulation, and defence priorities Frank, on-the-record perspective on party leadership and the state of British public life A memorable, well-paced session from a presenter used to live broadcasting and large audiences

Why organisations work with Michael Wilson He has interviewed chancellors, central bank governors, FTSE chief executives and finance ministers on live television for more than three decades, which is the exact skill set a panel on macro policy or market structure needs in the chair. He was a founder of Sky News in 1989 and built its business unit from scratch, which gives him an operator’s read on how a story moves between newsroom, market and boardroom. He co-authored Fixing Britain: The Business of Reshaping Our Nation with Lord Digby Jones, so he can speak with authority on UK industrial policy, productivity and reform rather than only commenting on it. The World Economic Forum named him Business Broadcaster of the Year, recognition that travels well with international investor and corporate audiences. Inside FTSE 100 and 250 boards he has worked as a media coach and mentor, which means a moderating brief comes with an instinct for what a CEO will say, will not say, and needs help saying. Biography highlights Founder member of Sky Television, 1989, and creator of the channel’s business unit. Business Editor of Sky News for around twenty years, anchoring Budget specials and major financial events through to 2009. Co-author with Lord Digby Jones of Fixing Britain: The Business of Reshaping Our Nation (Wiley, 2011). Voted Business Broadcaster of the Year by the World Economic Forum. Made a Freeman of the City of London in 2006. Visiting Fellow at Cranfield School of Management; currently Director of Business and Economics Editor at Arise News with regular commentary on GB News. Biography Sky News did not have a business unit when it launched in 1989. Michael Wilson built it. As a founder member of the channel, he set up the desk, the contact book and the editorial line that turned Sky into a credible voice on markets, the City and the British economy through the Lawson boom, the ERM crisis and the long period of growth that followed. He stayed for two decades as Business Editor, anchoring Budgets, rate decisions and the financial reporting cycle from the floor of the exchange to the steps of the Treasury. Before Sky he worked at Thames Television and helped found The City Programme in 1987. Since 2009 he has broadcast across BBC, ITV, Fox News, Al Jazeera and LBC, and he now serves as Director of Business and Economics Editor at Arise News with regular commentary slots on GB News. His authority on the substance, not only the craft, is documented. He co-wrote Fixing Britain: The Business of Reshaping Our Nation with Lord Digby Jones, published by Wiley in 2011, an argument for industrial reform rooted in conversations with British business leaders. He holds a Visiting Fellowship at Cranfield School of Management and was made a Freeman of the City of London in 2006. What corporate buyers tend to commission is the chairing and hosting work that sits on top of all this. He has run media training and mentoring inside FTSE 100 and 250 companies for years, which is why he can move between a serious investor Q and A, a panel of finance ministers, and a thousand-person black-tie audience without changing register, and bring each one back on time. Key speaking topics Business and economics broadcasting craft UK economic policy and the City Financial markets and monetary policy Corporate communications and media performance Conference moderation and on-stage interviewing After-dinner business commentary Industrial policy and productivity reform Ideal for Annual conferences, investor days and corporate AGMs that need a chair across macro, markets and corporate strategy. CEO and CFO communications teams looking for media coaching from a working broadcaster. Financial services and City audiences at flagship events, awards dinners and member functions. International investor and policy audiences where a recognised business broadcaster adds credibility to the chair. Audience outcomes A live read on the day’s market and policy news from someone who has spent decades interpreting it on air. A chairing performance that keeps panels on time, on subject and audible to a non-specialist room. A working briefing on how the City, the Treasury and the broadcast newsroom interact. A grounded view of UK industrial policy and reform drawn from his book with Lord Digby Jones. An after-dinner perspective that treats markets and economics as stories, not slides.

Why organisations work with Michaela Strachan Recognised across forty years of British television, from 1980s Saturday morning audiences to current Springwatch viewers and the 2025 Dancing on Ice final. That cross-generational recognition is unusual for a single broadcaster. Decades of on-location wildlife filming with named conservation organisations including SANCCOB in South Africa, the Borneo Orangutan Survival Foundation and the David Sheldrick Wildlife Trust. The specialism is built from fieldwork. BAFTA Best Children’s Presenter (2005) for Michaela’s Wild Challenge, with co-presenter status on BBC’s flagship Springwatch, Autumnwatch and Winterwatch since 2011 alongside Chris Packham. Live performance pedigree across formats most television presenters never touch. BBC live broadcasts, the 2018 Walking with Dinosaurs arena tour, and the 2025 Dancing on Ice final as the oldest contestant in show history. A genuine personal story for resilience and wellbeing briefs as a Breast Cancer Now ambassador, following her own 2014 diagnosis. Biography highlights BAFTA Best Children’s Presenter (2005) for Michaela’s Wild Challenge (Channel 5) Co-presenter, BBC Springwatch, Autumnwatch and Winterwatch (2011 to present), alongside Chris Packham Presenter, BBC Countryfile (1999 to 2009) Presenter, BBC’s The Really Wild Show (1993 to 2006) Presenter for Channel 5, National Geographic and Animal Planet, including Safari Live from Kruger National Park, Big 5 Little 5, Digging for Treasure and Extreme Conservation for BBC World News Author, Michaela Strachan’s Really Wild Adventures (2013) Finalist, ITV Dancing on Ice (2025), oldest contestant in the show’s history Biography Springwatch is one of British television’s most enduring nature programmes. Strachan has co-presented it since 2011 alongside Chris Packham, on location at reserves including Slimbridge and Wild Ken Hill. The role demands what few broadcasters can sustain over fifteen years: holding an audience through serious conservation content without losing either the science or the warmth. Before Springwatch came ten years on BBC’s Countryfile and thirteen years on The Really Wild Show, the BBC1 children’s wildlife series that ran until 2006. Earlier still, the breakthrough roles in 1980s Saturday morning television. Wide Awake Club and Wacaday with Timmy Mallett, then late-night music as the ‘Her’ in The Hitman and Her with Pete Waterman. The presenting craft is BAFTA-validated. She won Best Children’s Presenter at the 2005 British Academy Children’s Awards for Michaela’s Wild Challenge on Channel 5. International filming with SANCCOB, the Borneo Orangutan Survival Foundation and the David Sheldrick Wildlife Trust gives her the fieldwork credentials behind the broadcasting craft. Audiences from forty years of British television recognise her on stage. That reach is unusual. Sustainability and conservation briefs benefit from a host with subject knowledge to back the warmth. Resilience and wellbeing programmes can draw on her work as a Breast Cancer Now ambassador after her own 2014 diagnosis. Few television presenters span Wide Awake Club, Springwatch and the Dancing on Ice final. Key speaking topics Wildlife and conservation Climate and sustainability communication Hosting and moderating live events Personal resilience and reinvention Breast cancer awareness and recovery Television and broadcasting craft Ideal for Sustainability conferences, climate events and ESG forums needing a credible host who is comfortable with the subject matter Wildlife festivals, conservation fundraisers and environmental charities Awards ceremonies, gala dinners and corporate emcee briefs that benefit from a familiar British television voice Health, wellbeing and women’s events drawing on personal cancer recovery and resilience themes Audience outcomes A grounded picture of what conservation actually looks like behind the camera, from Borneo orangutan rescues to penguin colonies in South Africa Stories of professional reinvention across forty years on television, useful for audiences thinking about long careers and second acts A clear, generous account of life through a breast cancer diagnosis and recovery Behind-the-scenes detail on how Springwatch and other live nature broadcasts are actually made

Why organisations work with Mick Ebeling “Commit, then figure it out” is an operating method with shipped output behind it. The EyeWriter, Project Daniel, Bento, and Music: Not Impossible all began as problems that engineers and clinicians had filed under impossible. Three TIME Best Inventions across thirteen years: the EyeWriter (2010), Bento (2021), Music: Not Impossible (2023). No other individual has matched that benchmark. He frames innovation around what his team calls “absurdities”, unmet needs attached to named individuals. That vocabulary travels into executive conversations where abstract innovation language usually fails. A career as a film producer shapes how he tells the case studies. Audiences see the working details of each project, including how it got built and where the friction lived. Biography highlights Founder and CEO of Not Impossible, the studio that grew out of Not Impossible Labs and now spans the lab, the Not Impossible Institute, and the Not Impossible Foundation. Spin-out companies include Bento and Music: Not Impossible. Only individual to have three inventions named to TIME Magazine’s Best Inventions list: the EyeWriter (2010), Bento (2021), and Music: Not Impossible (2023). The EyeWriter is part of the permanent collection of New York’s Museum of Modern Art. Named to Fortune’s Top 50 World’s Greatest Leaders. Recipient of the Muhammad Ali Humanitarian of the Year Award. Two-time SXSW Innovation of the Year winner; Cannes Lions Titanium Lion winner for Project Daniel; nominated for Design of the Year by London’s Design Museum; WIRED Agent of Change. Author of “Not Impossible: The Art and Joy of Doing What Couldn’t Be Done”, Simon & Schuster, 2015. Founder of The Ebeling Group (2001), a commercial film and animation production company whose credits include Stranger Than Fiction, The Kite Runner, and Quantum of Solace. Biography In April 2009, a graffiti artist named Tony “Tempt” Quan drew his first new piece of art in seven years, using only the movement of his eyes. He had been silenced by ALS since 2003. The technology that made it possible, the EyeWriter, was assembled in a Los Angeles living room. Mick Ebeling had flown in five programmers and hackers from Graffiti Research Lab, Free Art and Technology Lab, and openFrameworks to attempt it. The device is now part of the permanent collection of New York’s Museum of Modern Art. That episode established the working method behind everything Ebeling has built since. Not Impossible Labs identifies what the team calls “absurdities”: specific human problems that today’s technology should be able to solve and has not. The model is to commit to one named individual, build a working solution, then scale it. The team calls this “Help One. Help Many.” The portfolio that followed kept the same shape. Project Daniel produced 3D-printed prosthetic arms for a teenage boy in South Sudan after a bombing severed his hands. The project was nominated for Design of the Year by London’s Design Museum and won the Cannes Lions Titanium Lion. Bento, a text-based system that connects food-insecure Americans with prepaid meals from local restaurants and grocery stores, started life as Hunger: Not Impossible. It has since spun off into its own company and been named a Fast Company World Changing Ideas honoree. Music: Not Impossible built haptic vests that let deaf and hard-of-hearing audiences feel live music as patterns of vibration. Three of these inventions sit on TIME Magazine’s Best Inventions list, a record no other individual holds. For organisations, the value lies less in the projects themselves than in what they prove. The word impossible is almost always doing more work than it deserves inside a company. Ebeling’s method, “commit, then figure it out”, comes from his earlier career as a film producer at The Ebeling Group, where impossible delivery dates were structural to the business. Audiences leave with a test for the word “impossible” they can run on their own organisation. They also leave with named cases they can cite the next time a hard idea gets that label. Key speaking topics Innovation methodology and the psychology of “impossible” Purpose-driven culture and organisational mission Radical collaboration across disciplines Technology applied to human problems The “Help One. Help Many.” model Storytelling as an innovation discipline Ideal for Innovation and R&D leaders stuck on problems they have classified as too hard to solve CEOs and executive teams trying to translate purpose statements into operating culture Innovation and transformation conferences seeking a credentialed keynote with a named methodology Cross-functional teams being asked to deliver outcomes their existing playbook does not cover Audiences in healthcare, pharma, technology, finance, and professional services, where ambitious problems are routinely filed as too hard to solve Audience outcomes A working vocabulary for separating ideas that are genuinely infeasible from ideas that are simply unattempted A set of named case studies they can cite when defending innovation budgets and ambition inside their organisation A different criterion for committing resources to a hard problem, modelled on a method that has shipped working technology repeatedly A more honest read on the gap between an organisation’s stated purpose and how that purpose shows up in daily decisions