High-performance speakers bring a unique blend of expertise, motivational strategies, and dynamic delivery to captivate your audience and memorably convey key messages. They can spark innovation, reinforce company goals, and provide actionable insights tailored to your industry. Sharing powerful stories and proven strategies empowers employees to embrace change, boost productivity, and foster a positive organisational culture. Investing in a skilled speaker transforms your event into a catalyst for growth and success.
Hiring a high-performance speaker through us at Great Business Speakers can elevate your event by delivering transformative insights and actionable strategies that drive excellence in individual and organisational performance. Our speakers are experts in unlocking potential, fostering resilience, and inspiring innovation, offering audiences practical tools to achieve sustained success. Whether in-person or virtual, a high-performance speaker energises the room and leaves a lasting impact, empowering attendees to exceed their limits and contribute to a culture of success.
Discover our High-Performance Speakers below, or contact the team at Great Business Speakers to enquire or book. +44 1753 439 289
Chris Cook is an ex Double Olympian & Double Commonwealth swimming champion having completed globally at international level.
He is a former BBC North East Sports Personality of the Year.
Chris is an accomplished motivational business and educational speaker with his keynote talk ‘Two Lengths’.
Chris Brindley MBE is a prominent UK Business Leader, Chair AT MCRactive and Zellar Limited, and Non-Executive Director (NED) at companies including Four Recruitment, Her Spirit, Equilibrium Asset Management, and Goodson Thomas. He is also an Elite Sports Business Mentor for The Premier League, Leadership Coach for Metro Bank, and a Trustee of Switch the Play Foundation.
He is the former Chair and NED of the Rugby Lead World Cup 2021 Board, Chair of GreaterSport Manchester and Sporting House, a Non-Executive at Rugby Football League, Super League, Move With Peppa, Rapport, and Manchester Football Association, and former Executive of British Gas, Metro Bank, and NatWest.
A leading authority on sales management, employee engagement and satisfaction, and customer experience, Chris holds Non-Executive Director positions at multiple organisations, and has been awarded UK Non-Executive Director (NED) of the Year, Most Outstanding Employer, and Britain’s Best Boss.
He has studied for a range of topics including strategic retail management at Manchester Business School, performance management, and executive coaching at Hult Ashridge, customer experience at Duke University, managing strategic risk at The Wharton School, managing for value creation at INSEAD, and executive leadership from the prestigious Harvard Business School.
Having originally trained as a carpenter, nobody outside of the sport of cycling would have known who Chris Boardman was until 1992, when he took Great Britain’s opening Gold medal at the Barcelona Olympics astride the infamous Lotus bike. Incredibly it was Britain’s first cycling Gold medal in 72 years.
The iconic image of the Lotus machine and pointy helmet made the name of Chris Boardman synonymous with cutting edge technology. It was a fascination with innovation and performance that has featured in nearly every aspect of his life since.
Brendan Hall is a renowned figure in the fields of speaking, coaching, and consulting, with a focus on fostering high-performance cultures within teams and organisations. His expertise lies in unlocking the untapped potential of teams, cultivating resilience, fostering connections, promoting collaboration, and enhancing leadership qualities.
As a sought-after speaker, Brendan has earned recognition for his ability to inspire audiences and deliver tangible outcomes.
He has been trusted by esteemed organisations such as PwC, Toyota, GSK, Nestle, Financial Times, Tesco, and Lloyds Banking Group.
He also holds positions as an adjunct lecturer at Ashridge Executive Education and Cranfield Business Schools, where he imparts his knowledge and experience to aspiring leaders.
Brad Burton is a force to be reckoned with in the world of motivational speaking and team building.
Known for his infectious enthusiasm, humour and high-energy dynamic approach twinned with street-smart wisdom, Brad has carved a unique niche in the industry, speaking globally at the highest level blending his background as a multi-million-pound business owner with his no-nonsense, motivational style.
At 50, he’s not just a speaker; he’s a doer, embodying the very essence of motivation and action. Brad’s journey is one of transformation and tenacity.
Dr Gary Crotaz, PhD, is an extraordinary polymath – a medical doctor and PhD, a world-class dancer, and later a C-Suite corporate leader with global retailers Mothercare and Selfridges Group.
Now he is a sought-after executive and strengths coach in the UK, Us and Europe, award-winning author, and inspiring leadership speaker. He is also the host of the hit leadership podcast ‘The Unlock Moment’, where he interviews many of the leading thinkers on finding purpose, achieving peak performance, and building leadership effectiveness from around the world.
Dr Gary Crotaz has featured in Forbes, the Telegraph, the Sunday Times and on TalkTV, and has spoken at events including CarFest, alongside Dr Rangan Chatterjee, Clive Branson, and Simon Ong. His innovative self-coaching book The IDEA Mindset by Dr Gary Crotaz was awarded Coaching Book of the Year by Henley Business School in 2022.
Kriss Akabusi MBE is an engaging, inspiring and transformational speaker, ideal for keynotes, endnotes, and award ceremonies.
Kriss will focus on topics such as goal-setting, teamwork, living in the moment, how to manage transitions and how to deliver peak performance.
Through discussions with your team during pre-event briefings, Kriss will tailor his speech to deliver on your key messages.
From his early years as a club rugby player for seven years as the England Rugby 7s coach, Ben Ryan then took a job coaching the Fiji Rugby 7s team. He is also the Director of Elite Performance for Brentford FC.
He is now one of the most in-demand leadership speakers on the circuit. He provides tools and messages that are applicable to any organisations. He provides essential factors for establishing and sustaining the right environment to cultivate success, as well as the need to align vision and values with courageous conversations.
Organisations and audiences around the world want to hear from the man who is fast achieving legendary status as one of the greatest coaches of his generation.
Ben Alldis is one of the UK’s most popular Peloton instructors with nearly 300k followers on Instagram. Formerly a finance professional in the City of London, Ben pivoted his career and followed his dream of healthy living to become a superstar in his field.
Having drastically expanded his own envelope, he is able to relate directly to people who feel the need to get motivated and expand their own life outside of their comfort zone.
He is available both in-person and for virtual engagements and fireside chats.
Kieran Tompsett is a star of the hit BBC show The Traitors. Keith, who is also a survivor of a knife attack, has lived experience of PTSD and trauma, and speaks openly about this and male mental health issues.
Kieran, who is also a business process consultant, was considered The Game Changer of The Traitors after delivering his ‘parting gift’, the exposure of Traitor Wilf which could change the lives of the three winning contestants. This made for one of the most dramatic and jaw-dropping reality scenes on British TV.
In recent years Kieran has suffered extensively with PTSD after suffering a number of emotional events, including the horrific and life-changing experience of being stabbed, losing his mother – who he described as his best friend – and the death of his 17-month old baby nephew.
Kieran is a multi-faceted speaker who draws on his experiences in the hit show The Traitors, as well as surviving a knife attack that could have taken his life; coping with PTSD, as well as talking more generally about men’s mental health, suicide, trauma and managing emotional challenges.
Katie Bulmer Cooke is a professional speaker and young entrepreneur with vast experience in delivering to the health and fitness industry and business arena. She has a unique ability to inspire SME’s, students and employees with her down-to-earth style and usable business takeaways.
If you want humour, truly useable content and a fresh and motivating experience, then you need to look no further.
Fitness entrepreneur Katie, began her journey in the world of business at the age of 16, setting up exercise classes in her hometown of Sunderland. Fast forward 14 years and Katie is now selling her fitness DVDs and online training programmes in the 11 countries across the world, as well as educating her fellow fitness professionals on how they can grow their businesses and developing new group fitness concepts for leisure trusts, councils and the private sector.
Referee Karl Dickson is a globally acclaimed figure in the sports industry, known for his roles as a professional Rugby Union referee and a former England and Harlequins player.
The pinnacle of his career came in 2023 when he officiated the quarter-final of the Rugby World Cup between Wales and Argentina, before serving as the assistant referee in the final between New Zealand and South Africa.
Karl Dickson is a well-known figure on the speaking circuit, for both keynote and after-dinner speaking on Confidence, Communication, Resilience, and High-Performance.
Andy McNab DCM MM joined the army in 1976, served in B squadron 22 SAS for nine years and commanded the legendary Bravo Two Zero patrol in the Gulf War.
After a fierce firefight, three of the eight men were killed; four were captured; one escaped. McNab was held prisoner for six weeks and relentlessly tortured.
He was the British Army’s most highly decorated serving soldier when he finally left the SAS in February 1993. He is the author of Bravo Two Zero, the bestselling war memoir of all time, and ten bestselling novels.
Andy Halliday is a former international hockey player and manager of England and Great Britain men’s hockey teams, as well as a former Specialist Firearms Officer at the Met Police. Andy now applies his skills as a coach, facilitator and keynote speaker.
Andy joined the Metropolitan Police when he was 18 years old. Here he developed his policing skills in a pressurised environment of 1980s London. After an initial period on the beat in Tottenham, he became a riot training instructor for seven years before transferring to the tactical Firearms Unit.
Spending more than three decades in pursuit of best practice in high performance environments, Andy understands what it takes to thrive and succeed, as well as the challenges faced by individuals and organisations from teenagers all the way up to executives in large businesses. Andy has been interviewed on many podcasts, talking about topics including growth mindset, stress reframing, learning from mistakes and his experience managing GB men’s hockey team and 30 years policing in London.
Dean Leak is a mindset coach, consultant, and leader within the British high-performance sports system, with over a decade of experience leading teams to deliver sustainable systems and programmes to support world-leading athletes.
A sports enthusiast and fascinated by all things psychology and understanding what drives us as a species, Dean has developed a skill for mentoring people in order to reach their full potential.
Since moving into senior leadership roles, his experience has seen him launch creative recruitment strategies, create business plans to governments, and implement complex talent pathways.
A creative, action-orientated, big-picture thinker, Dean Leak cares deeply about the people he works with, and is passionate about helping them create the best environment possible for them to succeed, both personally and professionally.
Former Squadron Leader John Peters came to the world’s attention in 1991, when his bruised and battered face flashed on our television screens. It was this shocking image that became a terrible symbol of Saddam Hussein’s ruthless aggression.
Since leaving the forces, John Peters has become a prominent keynote speaker, using his own dramatic, and sometimes harrowing, experiences to reach into our minds, and how us how we can overcome our worst fears.
David Coulthard is One of the world’s most widely recognised sports personalities, a former Formula 1 Grand Prix driver, television broadcaster, author and entrepreneur.
His business interests include co-founding Whisper Films, one of the UK’s fastest growing television production companies which produces sports and entertainment content including from NFL, Formula 1, SailGP, US Open Golf, FA Women’s Football and the Paralympic Games.
He is also a partner in Velocity Experience which develops and produces branded events for a wide range of corporate clients.
In 2010 he was appointed a Member of the Order of the British Empire (MBE) in the Queen’s Birthday Honours List.
Darren Hardy is a British Army veteran who reinvented himself as an award-winning athlete, speaker and entrepreneur.
After 15-years in the British Army and with a life-changing tour of Iraq, Darren had an abrupt end to his career when he was discharged on medical grounds. His time in the army left a big mark on him, leaving with a shoulder replacement and PTSD (Post Traumatic Stress Disorder ), an experience that led Darren to feel suicidal.
In 2018, he was ready to end his life but it was his two young daughters that gave him the motivation to change his mind and rebuild his life. With the support of Help4Heroes Darren chose to embark on a personal journey to strengthen his mental and physical resilience.
He went on to become a double gold medallist and Warrior Games record breaker and took on a number of extreme endurance challenges to push himself physically and mentally, attempting ten Ironman triathlons over ten consecutive days, in ten different places.
Darren Edwards is a record-breaking Disabled Adventurer, a leading authority on adaptability, resilience and teamwork, as well as an inspirational speaker and best-selling author.
At 26 years old, Darren experienced a devastating and life-changing climbing accident that left him paralysed from the waist down. What could have been the darkest time of his life was turned into a catalyst for personal growth and development.
His story is a living example of the limitless capabilities of the human spirit to overcome adversity. Since his accident, Darren has become a record-breaking Disabled Adventurer with a list of remarkable achievements. His inspiration is boundless, having redefined what is possible for a person with a spinal cord injury. Darren has shown what is possible with the right mindset and the ability to adapt to change.
He has understandably become a highly sought-after speaker to big global companies including British Airways, PepsiCo, Procter and Gamble and Google to name a few.
Daniel Chappell is a forward-thinking entrepreneur dedicated to redefining the health and wellness landscape through creative innovation and effective leadership.
Backed by a solid academic foundation, he has built his career in elite sporting environments, applying his expertise to drive both performance and wellbeing.
With more than ten years’ experience in the sports sector, Daniel has held strength and conditioning roles with organisations including Richmond upon Thames College, Bristol Bears, Bath Rugby, Imperial College London, Ealing Trailfinders Rugby Club, and PerformancePro.
In 2020, he launched VTMN, a premium supplement brand designed to support the demands of modern professionals. He is also the co-founder of UNTIL – the world’s first members’ club for health and wellness practitioners – created to give independent professionals the tools, space, and support they need to run thriving businesses without compromising their own wellbeing.
