2023 Happy Workplaces Conference

Bjarte Bogsnes, Chairman of Beyond Budgeting Roundtable

Beyond Budgeting

Because the future is unpredictable and people are trustworthy

Bjarte has a long international career, both in Finance and HR. He is a pioneer in the Beyond Budgeting movement and has been heading up the implementation of Beyond Budgeting at Equinor (formerly Statoil), Scandinavia’s largest company. He led a similar initiative in Borealis in the mid-nineties, one of the companies that inspired the Beyond Budgeting model. He has helped numerous other companies globally getting started on a Beyond Budgeting journey. 

Bjarte is Chairman of Beyond Budgeting Roundtable (BBRT). He is a popular international business speaker and Beyond Budgeting coach, and a winner of a Harvard Business Review/McKinsey Management Innovation award. Bjarte is the author of Implementing Beyond Budgeting - Unlocking the Performance Potential, where he writes about his almost 30 years long Beyond Budgeting journey. His new book This is Beyond Budgeting – A Guide to more Adaptive and Human Organizations with a foreword by Gary Hamel is out early 2023.

Arnaud Collery, founder of Stand Up For Passion

Authenticity is your new Currency

How life tests us and tests us again until we become our true self. We should look what our soul needs to experience to be free of others' expectation.

Arnaud Collery is a serial entrepreneur, international keynote speaker, and coach specializing in the future of work, employee performance, and happiness. With over 300 speaking engagements to his name, including 3 TEDx talks, Arnaud is recognized as a leading expert in his field. He is the author of two self-development books, Mister Happiness (Larousse, 2018) and Réinventez Votre Vie (Reinvent Your Life, Ideo, 2022).

Arnaud is the founder of Stand Up For Passion, a storytelling series featuring entrepreneurs and people from all walks of life who share extraordinary moments of truth. The event has gathered thousands of people and has traveled to countries such as Nepal, Japan, France, the UK, Canada, and Aruba. Many notable tech entrepreneurs have graced his stage, such as Alexandre Mars, Mathieu Nouzareth, and Ilan Abehassara.

Arnaud has pioneered the concept of "Chief Happiness Officer" and has conducted workshops for notable organizations such as the United Nations, World Happiness Summit, Dubai Expo, Google, Cartier, and Dior. He has been seen on NBC, MTV, E!, Le Monde, Les Echos, BFM Business, Capital, and Europe1. As a former Last Comic Standing Comedian and Start-up leadership fellow, Arnaud's dynamic personality and expertise have made him a sought-after speaker and coach worldwide.

Born and raised in Paris, Arnaud spent 20 years living abroad, mostly in the US and Japan, making him a true global citizen unbound by borders. He has worked in more than 30 countries for clients that include UNICEF, UNHCR, Google, Nestle, Cartier, Chanel, and Careem. Arnaud has appeared on stages, TV shows, and radios worldwide, including Europe, the US, Asia, Latin America, and the Middle East. He is the dad of a 5 year old.

Natalie Haskell, Chief Executive of CoppaFeel!

Enabling Happy Workplace Ideas 

Building a culture of Trust and Freedom

Natalie Haskell is the Chief Executive of breast cancer education charity CoppaFeel! She has been at the charity for 8 years, formerly responsible for CoppaFeel!'s brand, communications and marketing, stepping up to run the charity in 2017. She has played a leading role in the growth of the charity, spearheading more diverse, inclusive and accessible breast cancer campaigns and resources to ensure that all people have have the agency to advocate for their own health, with the mission of ensuring that all breast cancers are diagnosed early, where treatments are more effective and survival rates are higher.

Lisa Gill, host of the Leadermorphosis podcast

Embracing the elephant in the room

Lisa will explore the difference between psychological safety and psychological comfort. She will look at practices that do not just deal with but embrace the elephant in the room.

Lisa Gill is an organisational self-management coach and trainer with Tuff Leadership Training. She was included in the Thinkers50 Radar 2020 for her work with self-managing teams.

Lisa is also the host of the Leadermorphosis podcast for which she has interviewed 80+ future of work pioneers and the author of Moose Heads on the Table: Stories About Self-Managing Organisations from Sweden (2020).

Alex Soojung-Kim Pang, director at 4 Day Week Global

Rest: Why you get more done when you work less

Alex Soojung-Kim Pang is director of research and programs at 4 Day Week Global, a nonprofit promoting the 4-day workweek. His books — Work Less Do More: Designing the Four Day Week (Penguin, 2023); Shorter: Work Better, Smarter and Less — Here’s How (Public Affairs, 2020); Rest: Why You Get More Done When You Work Less (Basic Books, 2016), and The Distraction Addiction (Little Brown, 2013) — show how companies and individuals can better integrate rest, creativity, and focus into digital-age lives and work. Alex has been a senior consultant at Institute for the Future and Strategic Business Insights, and during his academic career was affiliated with Stanford University, UC Berkeley, Microsoft Research Cambridge, and Oxford University. Alex received a Ph.D. in history and sociology of science from the University of Pennsylvania.

Rachel Law, founder and CEO of PossAbilities

The Power of Dreams

Rachel Law explains the importance of following the chain of curiosity, being naive and believing in dreams and how it has made PossAbilities a haven of happiness.

Weary of 'death by a thousand cuts' whilst working in local authority adult social care, Rachel knew there had to be a better way.

It's one thing to believe it, yet quite another to become a modern day 'pied piper' and persuade 220 staff to follow you from the council role into a wholly independent social enterprise. But Rachel did it, and in 2014, PossAbilities was born.

Eight years later, PossAbilities has had eight consecutive years of growth from £6 million turnover to £18 million, eight consecutive years of surplus, and has built reserves from zero to £6 million — and has grown from 220 staff to over 600.

This is not a story of corporate strategy and organisational structures. It's a story of passion; pigs; goats; an urban farm and wellbeing garden; backed by a Happiness Manifesto and a permission to have fun.