Speaker

A map you can't fully read, a crew you haven't tested yet or an island that might not even have treasure on it. And you're the one who has to get everyone there alive. Sound familiar?

That's the feeling nearly every entrepreneur or business leader has on day one. The difference is, once we get stuck into the daily grind, most business leaders forget they're on an adventure. The map gets buried under spreadsheets, board packs and the relentless noise of running a company. The crew starts pulling in different directions and one day the leader looks up and realises they have no idea where they're heading anymore.

In this keynote, Matt takes the audience on a voyage through the world of Treasure Island, and their own leadership journey. Finding the map, choosing who gets on the boat and addressing the potential mutiny that nobody saw coming. The storm that changes everything, as well as the moment you finally sight land and must question — was the treasure what you thought it was?

Every stage is brought to life through Matt's own story, building and selling two businesses, rowing 3,000 miles across the Atlantic, and the brutally honest moments of doubt, failure and discovery in between. It's funny, it's personal, and it lands.

Audiences will leave with:

• • A clearer sense of where they are on their own map, and where they've drifted
• • A practical framework for the journey ahead
• • The confidence to stop navigating blind and start leading with purpose

Available as a keynote or a 3-hour interactive workshop (with delegate workbook and map).

There's an uncomfortable and often ignored truth — the most valuable leadership lessons you'll ever learn won't happen in a training room. They'll happen at 3am when you can't sleep because you've just bet your house on a business you're not sure will survive. Or in the middle of an ocean when a Boxing Day storm is trying to capsize your boat. Or maybe even on a pavement in Brighton when your body finally tells you what your brain refused to accept.

Matt Garman has had to address all three. He's convinced that these raw, unscripted, and often terrifying moments teach more about leadership than any curriculum, case study or MBA module ever will do.

This session challenges conventional leadership development head on. Instead of starting with theory and hoping it survives when challenged, Matt starts with some reality — the mistakes, the gambles, the moments of genuine vulnerability, as he pulls out the lessons that stick. It's often not comfortable, it's not always corporate, but it's brutally honest, experience-driven learning that changes how leaders think and act long after they leave the room.

Audiences will leave with:

• • A fresh perspective on where their real leadership education has come from
• • The courage to trust their own unconventional journey over someone else's textbook
• • Practical, immediate takeaways — not theory they'll forget by Friday

Available as a keynote or a 3-hour interactive workshop (with delegate workbook and map).

Matt takes audiences inside the reality of building a business that can run — and sell — without the founder. He draws on his own PE exit, where he learned that buyers don't buy businesses; they buy leadership teams. And he draws on the Atlantic row, where he faced the same question every business owner faces: can this team perform without me holding it together?

The talk is direct, honest, and commercially focused. Stories from extreme conditions illustrate principles that apply in every boardroom. Audiences leave with a clear understanding of what exit-ready leadership actually looks like — and what it doesn't.

Ideal for: Owner-managed businesses (£2m–£30m), PE-backed leadership teams, Vistage and peer groups, industry conferences focused on growth or exit.

Matt's workshops are practical, not theoretical. He works with leadership teams to apply The Uncharted Framework™ directly to their business. The four stages — Dream, Plan, Execute, Evolve — are mapped across four layers: Vision, People, Process, and Management.

Teams leave with a clear picture of where their commercial gaps are and a plan to close them.

These workshops are often booked as follow-ups to keynotes, or as standalone sessions for leadership teams preparing for growth, exit, or succession.

My background, rejecting academic schooling and entering the workforce at 16, resonates powerfully with young audiences. I speak frankly and honestly, empathising with their difficulties and illustrating how my own journey could have gone wrong, but reassuring them that exam results don't dictate lifetime success.

I emphasise empathy, compassion and kindness. I always adhere to required protocols and am conscious of not making alternative routes seem easy.