Dr Sania Nishtar, a cardiologist, author and activist, is Special Assistant of Pakistan’s Prime Minister and Federal Minister, Poverty Alleviation and Social Safety Ministry, Government of Pakistan. She is the founder of Ehsaas, the Government’s flagship social protection program, and leads its implementation. In that role she spearheaded the country’s response to the Covid-19 pandemic to ensure the weakest citizens were supported. Dr Nishtar co-chairs the U.S National Academy of Sciences Global Study on the Quality of Healthcare in low and middle-income countries and chairs the advisory board of the United Nations International Institute for Global Health.

Canadian Al Etmanski has, since the birth of his daughter Liz, who has a disability, worked to improve conditions for disabled persons all over the world. Al is behind several innovations that have changed the disability system, including a first-in-kind savings plan for people with disabilities, which has made it possible to start to break the connection between disability and poverty. Al focuses on how power structures, policy and culture interact with system changes – and on why legislation cannot bring about change on its own.

Sophie creates programmes that break reinforcing cycles of social disadvantage. She is the founder of Pause which works with mothers to break out of cycles of partner violence, abuse and pregnancies. Pause creates a space for these mothers to develop their own plans for their future which services are organised to support. Under Sophie's leadership Pause has scaled from a single pilot project to a national organization with programmes across the UK. Her next venture Whatever It Takes aims to break cycles of violence, exclusion and disadvantage among young people. On the basis of these two initiatives Sophie is developing a higher level methodology which could be applied to any challenge involved in breaking ingrained cycles of disadvantage and exclusion.

Giulio Quaggiotto is the Head of UNDP’s Strategic Innovation unit, working with governments across the world to develop renewal capabilities and accelerate impact on complex development challenges. Prior to joining UNDP, he was the Director of Community at Climate KIC and an Innovation Advisor for the Prime Minister's Office in the UAE. Giulio's career includes stints at Nesta, WWF and the World Bank. He was also the manager of the Jakarta Lab of the UN Global Pulse, a flagship innovation initiative of the United Nations Secretary-General on big data for public policy. Giulio’s most recent work has focused portfolios approaches to system transformation. He is an MIT Research Associate with a focus on lead user innovation. He tweets @gquaggiotto.

Diane is the Project Director of the Winnipeg Boldness Project, an ambitious social innovation initiative seeking to create large-scale systems change for children and families in the Point Douglas neighbourhood of Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada. She has worked tirelessly for initiatives that promote Indigenous People’s values and ways of knowing and being and is a passionate community leader committed to the pursuit of pimadaziwin (the good life) for all families and children. She is a proud member of Skownan First Nation. Diane is adept at leading collaborative processes that involve numerous cross-sector partners and stakeholders, tenaciously seek solutions to barriers, and pursue tangible outcomes for the benefit of the community.

Alex Fox is CEO for the UK network ‘Shared Lives Plus’, which is a network of families who make their homes and their family lives open to young people and adults who need more support with daily life. Alex was appointed OBE (Most Excellent Order of the British Empire) in 2016 for this work which is demonstrating a very different care system. Through this and his role as Vice Chairman at ‘Think Local Act Personal’ Alex focuses on what he calls ‘The Paradox of Scale’ – how to retain the value of intimate human relationships within large-scale systems of care. Alex advocates that it is possible to create practical welfare systems with real relationships at their heart.

The Paul Hamlyn Foundation is one of the largest independent grant-making foundations in the UK. Mr. Sutton works with the Paul Hamlyn Foundation’s ‘Shared Ground Fund’, which funds interventions that address issues in migration and integration. Here Alex is deliberately supporting only those initiatives that have a clear systemic aim. On the day he will talk about the importance of developing interventions at all levels of a system, and will share what the Foundation has learned through their systematic work on breaking negative patterns in the wider immigration system.

Anna Fjeldsted is chief psychologist and senior social innovator at the ROCKWOOL Foundation Interventions Unit. Anna’s work takes a principle-based approach to developing and scaling social innovations. Anna works with delivery teams across Denmark to enable them to put radical new approaches into practice based on a core set of principles, rather than a delivery manual. Anna has a background as a practicing psychologist, teacher, consultant and supervisor. She has worked with change processes in many different social fields and before joining the ROCKWOOL Foundation she has been associated with DISPUK and Psykiatrifonden as well as the Center for Narrative Therapy in Denmark.

Jennie Winhall is a leading thinker in system innovation. She designs new services and interventions to create systemic social impact, such as the ROCKWOOL Foundation’s employment efforts for young people, NExTWORK. Jennie has spent many years experimenting with how to design interventions that change systems, previously through her work at Participle, featured in Hilary Cottam’s book Radical Help, which launched a series of new public services across the UK that exemplified a new ‘relational’ welfare system.

Charles Leadbeater has been at the forefront of innovation movements since his report The Rise of the Social Entrepreneur was published in 1997, and advises companies, governments and municipalities around the globe. His best selling books include We Think: Mass Innovation Not Mass Production, and his influential TED talks on education and open innovation have been watched by millions of people. Charles is a visiting professor at the Institute for Innovation and Public Policy at University College London and a partner in the system innovation agency ALT/Now. Charles will be the moderator through the week.