Keynote Speakers

Soumitra Dutta – Opening Keynote Speaker

Global perspectives on technology - enabled innovation, talent management and the knowledge economy

Professor Dutta is an authority on all aspects of knowledge management, with a long-time focus on how to drive business innovation and growth through the right combination of innovative people and information technology. He is an expert on off-shoring and outsourcing strategies, with special depth on India and China.

Author of The Bright Stuff, on how traditional businesses can develop innovative business models that exploit the potential of technology the way that start-ups do, he is also the Roland Berger Professor of Business and Technology and Dean of External Relations at INSEAD, named the No 1 international business school in the world by BusinessWeek.

As the former Dean of Executive Education at INSEAD, the largest executive education programme in the world, he has advised leading multinationals on how innovative people and technology can make old businesses new, and on talent management and leadership development.

Professor Dutta is Visiting Professor at the University of California at Berkeley’s Haas School of Business, Solvay Business School (Brussels) and Athens Laboratory for Business Administration. He is also a Fellow of the World Economic Forum.

Richard Reeves – Closing Keynote Speaker

Putting the pleasure back into work: re-evaluating modern working life

Voted European Business Speaker of the Year 2006, Richard Reeves is one of the leading experts on workplace trends. He energises, provokes and amuses while delivering genuine leading-edge thinking on the key business issues of the day. Richard's varied background, spanning senior executive positions, central government, top-rank journalism and academia, gives his presentations a unique blend of experience and breadth of vision.

A high-profile writer and first-choice commentator, Richard is a columnist for Management Today (UK) and writes regularly for The Observer, The Guardian, Director magazine and numerous other publications. He is also a regular on showcase radio and TV programmes.

Richard is the author of the highly-publicised Happy Mondays: Putting the Pleasure Back into Work, which calls for revolutionary re-evaluation of modern working life. He runs his own consultancy and research business, working with blue-chip clients and leading research institutes. He is a research associate of The Work Foundation, a member of the advisory board of The Talent Foundation and a Fellow of the RSA (Royal Society of Arts).