Opening Keynote

Fireside Chat with Amanda Blanc and Chris Lay

The Panel will scan the risk horizon and consider how strategy, risk appetite and risk culture can be aligned to enable business leaders to take the decisive actions needed for a winning organisation.    

The Panel will consider how distinctiveness can be defined and developed to protect margins by competing beyond rates and remaining relevant in a changing world.    

Professor Sir David Spiegelhalter is a best-selling author and Chair of the Winton Centre for Risk and Evidence Communication hosted within the Department of Pure Mathematics and Mathematical Statistics at the University of Cambridge. The Centre aims to ensure that quantitative evidence and risk is presented to people in a fair and balanced way.

David will address the proposition that data does not speak for itself – it needs people to speak honestly and carefully on its behalf. A misunderstood statistic could have terrible consequences in health, wealth, and justice. By contrast better statistics should lead to better debate and hopefully, better decisions.

Tim Shipman is the Chief Political Commentator and former Political Editor of the Sunday Times. In over 15 years of journalism he has reported on some of the biggest events in British, American and international politics.

Before joining the Sunday Times, Tim served as Deputy Political Editor of the Daily Mail, and as Washington Correspondent for the Sunday Telegraph. He also held several posts, both Political and Foreign, at the Daily and Sunday Express.

Tim has reported on stories from the war in Kosovo to Bill Clinton’s impeachment. He’s covered security and international relations, and led the Express’s coverage of the Iraq War, reporting from the US Central Command in Doha.

In the UK, Tim is a familiar face in the corridors of Westminster and has insider knowledge on the plots, personalities and procedures that define parliamentary life. As well as serious insight in to the political events of the day, and the likely outcomes, he also delivers amusing anecdotes from his time following the Obama campaign to the secrets of the Commons’ bars and committee rooms.