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A community committed to
positive change

Every year, millions of people decide to make changes in their lives.

We try to be healthier, to save more money and behave better.

But then something happens.

As the weeks go by, new habits start slipping.

'Changemakers' bring together a group of social innovators, business leaders, thinkers and activists committed to sharing ideas about making positive change last.

'Wealth' changemakers

Andrew Hallam

Author, financial wellness speaker

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Author, financial wellness speaker

Andrew Hallam

Many people aren't comfortable talking about money.

It's not usually a conversational dinner-time topic, and its principles are rarely taught in schools.

Andrew's goal is to have a "conversation" about it in his blog. 

He is also the author of the books: Millionaire Teacher: The Nine Rules of Wealth You Should Have Learned at School & Millionaire Expat: How To Build Wealth Living Overseas.

If you'd like to find out more about Andrew's investing philosophy, read his "Nine Laws to Financial Freedom." 

‘AES isn't just a pioneer...it's a bright light of integrity among a cesspool of alternatives.’

Andrew Hallam

Hire Andrew » 

Steve Cronin

Personal finance courses & mentoring

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Personal finance courses & mentoring

Steve Cronin

Steve studied Psychology at Cambridge.

Over the past 17 years he advised the top management of banks, asset managers and sovereign wealth funds all over the world, including princes and prime ministers.

In 2016 he set up a small blog about saving, primarily for expats and soon realised he could help more people and get more satisfaction through this than doing anything else. This is how he spends his days now.

 If you have a question or a comment, or you would like to request personal coaching, a group/corporate workshop, an article or a speech, you can contact him here.

Robin Powell

Journalist, financial literacy campaigner

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Journalist, financial literacy campaigner

Robin Powell

Robin is an award-winning journalist and campaigner for positive change in global investing, advocating better investor education and greater transparency.

For most of his career in mainstream journalism, Robin worked in broadcast news and current affairs. For 14 years he was a news reporter and documentary maker for ITV Central and network ITV News and ITV Sport. He went freelance in 2005, and spent seven years working mainly for Sky News and for The Politics Show on BBC1.

Robin is a member of the Chartered Institute of Journalists and was a Visiting Media Fellow at Duke University in North Carolina.

Married with two children, Robin lives in rural North Warwickshire. A former intern on Capitol Hill, Robin has supported a number of lost political causes over the years, and a few sporting ones, including Aston Villa Football Club and the England cricket team.

As well as The Evidence-Based Investor, he edits Adviser 2.0, a blog which explores the changes taking place within the financial advice profession.

He is the writer and presenter of many highly-acclaimed online documentaries about investing, among others the titles Index Funds: The 12-Step Recovery Program for Active Investors, and Investing: The Evidence.

Robin is Founder and Executive Director of Ember Regis Group and its subsidiaries Regis Media, a niche provider of content marketing for financial advice firms and wealth managers with an evidence-based investment philosophy, as well as Ember Television, which produces and distributes broadcast-quality video content. Ember specialises in sharing new and disruptive ideas and in helping clients to become thought leaders in their field.

Brian Portnoy, CFA, PhD

Investor, writer, and creator of Shaping Wealth

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Investor, writer, and creator of Shaping Wealth

Brian Portnoy, CFA, PhD

Over the past 29 years, Brian has been an educator, investor, writer, and entrepreneur. During his career in the hedge fund and mutual fund industries, he built a passion for simplifying the complex world of money. He's written two books in the field of behavioural finance, The Investor’s Paradox and The Geometry of Wealth, which address not only how to make better financial decisions but how money figures into a meaningful life. Alongside writing, he has delivered keynote addresses, smaller workshops, and private consultations across the world to thousands of individuals, advisors, and institutions. He is actively engaged in the push for better youth financial literacy and serves on the advisory board of the Alliance for Decision Education.

He founded Shaping Wealth to be able to advise on financial wellness without conflict or constraint. He tries to help answer the question that quietly keeps many of us up at night: Am I going to be okay? Because money influences the question, it must also be part of the answer. To align purpose with practice and build good habits that stick, we must leverage insights from disciplines ranging from social psychology to neuroscience to behavioural finance. His financial wellness programs and direct coaching build on those disciplines.

He grew up in Pittsburgh, went to college in Ann Arbor, and earned his doctorate at The University of Chicago, where he studied the social and economic institutions of capitalism. He lives on the north side of Chicago and his “why” in all of this is his wife and three teenage kids.

Jason Butler

Financial well-being expert

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Financial well-being expert

Jason Butler

Jason provide's motivation, guidance and tools to help people achieve financial comfort. Access to his blog, tools, podcast and videos are all free for personal use. To find out how he works with businesses to improve their employees’ financial well-being, click here.

Jason is a professionally qualified personal finance expert with extensive practical experience and a deep understanding of the latest behavioural and psychological research.

He is a Chartered Fellow of both the Chartered Institute for Securities & Investment and the Personal Finance Society. He had a 25-year career as a financial adviser, 17 years of which were leading the wealth management firm that he founded. He sold his stake in that business in 2015.

He is a published author, Financial Times personal finance columnist, host of the Real Money Stories podcast and a Keynote speaker on financial well-being. He regularly provides expert comment on personal finance to the BBC, Sky and a range of other publications, media and websites.

As Head of Financial Education at Salary Finance, the workplace financial well-being provider, he oversees the financial well-being support available to around 3 million UK employees from companies like BT, Sainsbury's, DHL, Co-op, and many NHS Trusts and local authorities. He also works with a handful of wealthy families each year to prepare heirs to receive their future financial inheritance through his Generation Next consultancy. 

If you would like to get in contact, please do so via enquiries@jason-butler.com.

'Health' changemakers

Victoria Tipper

Health & Wellness NLP Life Coach

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Health & Wellness NLP Life Coach

Victoria Tipper

My journey started where many of you stand today. I’ve felt the fatigue, the acne, the low self-esteem and faced my family’s genetic pre-disposition to cancer and heart disease.

Early on though, I recognized that I was in the driving seat of my life and the research was out there for me to achieve my health and life goals.

I trained extensively to become a fully qualified nutritionist, life coach and fitness trainer with a degree in genetics and a Masters in Human Nutrition and it transformed my life. I now use this knowledge to change the lives of people from all over the world, from all walks of life.

Life is not about being ‘perfect’, it’s about being the best version of yourself. My clients come to me because they know I consistently keep on top of the latest research, I am able to break the jargon down into stress-free ‘bite-size’, actionable chunks and I’m by their side all the way!”

Leonora Franklin

Health & well-being advocate

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Health & well-being advocate

Leonora Franklin

Leonora is an accomplished professional with 20+ years of experience of delivering innovative solutions to the workplace in the UK and the Middle East. An overriding passion for improving health and well-being across the community has led her to offer a range of solutions supporting organisations to create environments where healthier and more productive teams can flourish. 

Samira Cutts

Ergonomics

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Ergonomics

Samira Cutts

Samira has developed a broad range of experiences over an eighteen year period of working in the UK and Middle East. Her vast practice includes working with clients experiencing neuro-orthopaedic conditions, stress-related disorders, chronic pain, and movement dysfunctions.

Samira has worked in an array of clinical settings ranging from acute, sub-acute to long term care, which have assisted her with garnering widespread knowledge and familiarity of a wide spectrum of health disorders.

Dr. Samer Obeidat

Men’s Health

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Men’s Health

Dr. Samer Obeidat

Dr. Samer Obeidat, MBBS, MRCS(Ed), FRCS(Urol), FEBU is a highly accomplished Consultant Urological Surgeon with a wealth of knowledge and experience of over 14 years. Fluent in both Arabic and English, Dr. Obeidat is British Board Certified (CCT-UK) with outstanding clinical and operative skills. He practices his speciality with the utmost care, expertise and compassion, taking a personalized approach towards medicine.

 

Dr. Maria Karakoulaki

Women’s Health

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Women’s Health

Dr. Maria Karakoulaki

Dr. Maria Karakoulaki studied Medicine at Ludwig-Maximilian University of Munich (LMU), one of the most prestigious universities in Germany, and at Cornell University NY USA. She then specialised in Obstetrics and Gynaecology at Munich Hospital Harlaching – LMU teaching hospital, and in Elena Venizelou, which is the biggest public maternity and gynaecological hospital in Greece. She is both German (Facharzt) and Greek board certified.

 

Dr Saliha Afridi

The LightHouse Arabia

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The LightHouse Arabia

Dr Saliha Afridi

Dr. Saliha Afridi is a clinical psychologist. She is also the founder and Managing Director
of The LightHouse Arabia, a community wellness centre in Dubai.

Dr. Afridi earned her Bachelor’s Degree from the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor,
and her Master’s and Doctorate Degrees in Clinical Psychology from the Arizona School
of Professional Psychology in Phoenix. Her clinical training has been as a generalist working with children, adolescents, and adults on a range of diagnoses. Her expertise is in parenting, as well as burnout within the workplace sector.

Dr. Afridi moved to the UAE from the United States 11 years ago to make a positive impact
on the mental health of the region. She established The LightHouse Arabia, which is now one of the largest mental health centres in the UAE. Her mission was to make mental health services accessible to the UAE community. Since its founding in 2011, Dr. Afridi and her team have contributed thousands of hours to the community, free of charge, to educate and raise awareness on best practices for mental health and wellness. Her most recent achievement was bringing the internationally acclaimed Australian Mental Health First Aid to the UAE, where her team has trained over 1,000 mental health first aiders for early detection and treatment of mental health difficulties within their communities.

A frequent guest expert on radio and in print media, Dr. Afridi spends extensive time
consulting with private sector companies and government organisations on programs
related to mental health and wellness.

You can find Dr Saliha on:

Instagram
Facebook
YouTube
LinkedIn

'Education' changemakers

Marilyn Pinto

Kids Finance Initiative

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Kids Finance Initiative

Marilyn Pinto

“If there is a book that you want to read, but it hasn’t been written yet, you must be the one to write it.”– Toni Morrison

Financial literacy was a subject I wanted my daughters to learn about, and it wasn’t being taught in the current education system. Our kids will go through 15 years of schooling and not have a single class on how to manage money, or budget, or choose a credit card, much less use one prudently. So, I decided I was going to do something about it. That’s how the Kids Finance Initiative got started.

Our kids are going to make financial decisions throughout their lives, and as parents, it’s up to us to ensure that they’re prepared to face them intelligently. This program gives them just that—the understanding and the confidence to make conscious money decisions. This skill isn’t just something nice to have; it is a social imperative.

With a team of dedicated and highly trained professionals, who all have advanced degrees in finance, business, and education, but who more importantly have the drive and the passion to teach. KFI has brought a number of innovative and ground-breaking programs to the UAE.

By conducting in-depth programs and not just workshops, we built a deeper understanding of the various topics we teach. By engaging with parents, we ensured that the kids’ cycle of learning is deeper. By building relationships with the kids, we instilled in them a curiosity for learning that will outlast our interaction with them.

I believe that our kids are capable of learning, understanding, and doing so much more than we give them credit for.

At KFI, we are passionate about helping kids realize their potential, igniting their curiosity, and stretching the horizons of their minds. We help them overcome their limiting beliefs and encourage them to achieve more than they think they are capable of.

That’s what we mean by #EducationReimagined.

Mick Todd

Executive Performance Coach

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Executive Performance Coach

Mick Todd

2b Limitless is a multi-award-winning professional coaching and training organisation focussed on strengths, engagement, performance and transformation. Headed by Mick Todd, ‘Acquisition International’ UAE Executive Coach of the year 2016 and ‘International Advisory Experts’ UAE Executive Coach of the year 2017, they are focussed on c-suite executives, senior leaders, entrepreneurial leaders and high-performance teams. Based in Dubai, they also have offices in Phuket and Brisbane.

2b Limitless’ business is built around executive coaching programs and their 2BYB International Goal-Setting Events. They also deliver targeted training and workshops around strengths, goals, strategy, purpose, vision & values and extraordinary success.

They deliver excellence across a broad spectrum of personal and professional success via the following team members

Mick Todd – Founder, Senior Executive Success, Leadership & Strengths Coach • David Labouchere OBE – The Art of the Possible, Strategy & Change • Sacha Fitch – Executive Strengths, Leadership Consultant Facilitator • Mark Bradley – Executive Coach, Certified Strengths Coach • Brian Clarke – Leadership Development Coach • Kim Page – Communication & Influence Coach and Trainer • Heidi Jones – Health & Wellness Coach • Jason Grange – Art of the Possible Facilitator • Bronwyn Byrnes – Corporate Role Play

Mike Hoff

Business Coach

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Business Coach

Mike Hoff

Based in Dubai, MHC is a business coaching Company. They will work with you to get your team performance to the maximum potential, enabling them to lead business growth and the drive for delivering outstanding bottom line results for Your Company.

Mike and Claire are the Co-Founders of MHC. Between them they have over 60 years experience gained from working in senior leadership roles across multiple corporate sectors. They have spent the last 16 years from working in the Middle East.

Their mission is to give the business owners back their freedom and allow them to grow their team and business in a sustainable, manageable and more enjoyable way. They achieve this by partnering with clients and embarking together on a growth roadmap to success.

Services include executive coaching, peer to peer executive boards, outsourced HR and business management software.