Blaire Palmer Profile Picture

Keynote SpeakerBlaire Palmer

Expert on leadership and change, author, coach and consultant with two decades of experience

Blaire Palmer is the authority on disrupting the future of leadership, and wants to help you lead the workplace reformation. She brings more than two decades of experience in coaching boards and senior leaders to provoke everyone to think more critically about the idea of work and leadership itself. As... Read more

Biography

Blaire Palmer is the authority on disrupting the future of leadership, and wants to help you lead the workplace reformation. She brings more than two decades of experience in coaching boards and senior leaders to provoke everyone to think more critically about the idea of work and leadership itself.

As an expert keynote speaker, Blaire uses her bold and provocative perspective to bust myths about what it means to lead and to educate today’s leaders on how they can truly inspire their teams to step up and take on the challenges of operating in constantly changing times.

Blaire leaves her audiences feeling stimulated by fresh ideas and empowered to rethink their approach to work. Blaire spent a decade as one of the youngest female producers in the fast-paced environment of BBC’s Today programme, over which time she became increasingly fascinated by the idea of leadership. This led her to take the leap from this safe and respected job to train as one of Europe’s first corporate coaches and start her own company to spread her refreshing ideas about leadership and how businesses need to evolve for the new century. Over the last 25 years she has worked with a wide variety of multinational corporations and organisations such as Mattel, Airbus, Roche Pharmaceuticals, GSK, the FA, Havas Lynx, DX, Travis Perkins, the BBC and Rexel.

Blaire is able to use her expertise working in such a diverse range of businesses to make sense of the way generative AI, hybrid working and the long tail of the pandemic, growing understanding of mental health, the rising cost of living and cost of supply, and global unrest have all come together to create a uniquely contemporary crisis in the workforce. More than that, she proposes uniquely contemporary solutions for businesses whose workforce is not just geographically dispersed across the world, but whose needs and wants have changed substantially in the past few years alone.

She is the author of four books on leadership and work: The Hyper-Creative Personality: How to Focus Your Ideas and Become the Most Successful Person You Know, The Recipe for Success: What Really Successful People Do and How You Can Do it Too, What’s Wrong with Work: The five frustrations of work and how to fix them for good. Her 2024 book, Punks in Suits: How to lead the workplace reformation, is a provocative rallying cry for organisations to ask uncomfortable questions about how they work, and grapple with whether or not their approach is still fit for purpose in today’s world.

"Everyone found Blaire incredibly inspiring, engaging and said the talk was pitched at the right level for the group. They can be a tricky bunch to please…so to have such high praise from across the board is fantastic." Cycle and Outdoor Concepts
"Blaire Palmer gave insight to the core of what it takes to be a leader today. Blaire brought a sense of realism, humour and practicality to an energising session, leaving a deep impression on the audience" Ian Gregory – Head of Learning and Development at Foreign Commonwealth Office
"Blaire’s interactive and engaging session on behaviour change was the perfect fit for our conference. Her fascination with leadership and change shone through and she presented our audience with an array of real take-home advice that resonated with everyone in the room” Luke Nichols - Editor edie.net (sponsors of Sustainability Live)
"Blaire captivated our audience in presenting her experience and advice with regard to empowering McCormick's staff to succeed and develop. She was upbeat, engaging and gave us confidence that we are on the right journey with regard to diversity in our company." Melanie Williams, VP Human Resources EMEA, McCormick UK Ltd

Popular Talks by Blaire Palmer

  • Punks in Suits: How to lead the workplace reformation by harnessing personal leadership
    The business environment has never been more challenging than it is right now, and senior leaders are the ones bearing the pressure and responsibility. Levels of trust in authority figures are as low as they’ve ever been. But what if we could turn every individual employee and contributor in an...
  • Seeking Expansiveness: Embracing individuality
    Of course, inclusion is a huge buzzword right now. But what does it mean to your organisation? If it ends at the hiring stage, you won’t be creating thriving, loyal, motivated teams. You’ll simply be meeting a quota with no discernible benefit to your business or the clients you serve....
  • A Brilliant Gamble: Busting the myths of change
    If there’s one thing we know by now, it’s that change is a constant. New challenges – from generative AI to a cost of living and supply crisis – are being thrown at us every day. If teams are not ready to meet this new future head-on, it is hard...
  • Remote and Hybrid working and collaboration
  • Empowerment and Engagement
  • Diversity and Inclusion
  • The future world of work and leadership
  • Mental Health
  • Employee Engagement
  • Leadership and Culture change
  • Executive coaching for leaders
  • High performance Teams