Sophie Williams Keynote Speaker

Author of Millennial Black (2021) Anti-Racist Ally (2020), and The Glass Cliff (2024)
Founder of @OfficialMillennialBlack Instagram page with 100k+ followers
A leading voice on diversity, inclusion, allyship and women in leadership

Sophie Williams's Biography

Sophie Williams is an author, equality advocate, TED speaker (over 1.5 million views), United Nations Delegate, and expert on racial and gender diversity, equity and inclusion.

In her three successful books The Glass Cliff (2024), Millennial Black (2021) and Anti-Racist Ally (2020), Sophie leads the conversation around how to be anti-racist and an ally, as well as the challenges faced by underrepresented leaders in the workplace – particularly women and Black and Global Majority people.

She is widely considered a leading voice on diversity, inclusion and allyship and has started an international conversation around The Glass Cliff – the invisible but precarious position that so many underrepresented leaders find themselves in, once they have broken through the glass ceiling in their professional lives.

As a speaker, Sophie is warm and engaging, breaking down difficult and complex topics in approachable and inclusive ways. Through her talks and presentations, Sophie shows audiences how to take the first steps on their own journey to activism or allyship and greater inclusion or all. She encourages people to build on their existing foundations and demonstrates how to truly build equality into both their personal and working lives. Sophie regularly appears on expert panels, delivers talks, presentations, and workshops for clients from a range of sectors, including Amazon, Apple, Barclays, Cambridge University, Google, Meta, the NHS, The Rio Ferdinand Foundation, Sky, and the UK Civil Service.

Sophie began her career in advertising, starting out as a runner, before working her way up to holding the positions of COO and CFO. She was the former Global Manager of Production Planning at Netflix – in Spring 2021 she led the European employee walkout in protest of transphobic content on the platform. She has been part of the UN Women UKs delegations to the United Nations CSW Conferences for the past 3 years.

Racial equity and inclusion

Gender equity and inclusion - with a focus on women in the workplace and in leadership

The Glass Cliff - what happens when you break through the glass ceiling / the challenges that women face in their leadership journeys

Allyship / Anti-Racism in day-to-day life and the workplace

Building anti-racist workplaces

Intersectionality - with a focus on race and gender

Building successful, diverse, working environments, based on her experience as a Chief Operating Officer and successful professional career

She draws on senior leadership experience at Netflix and as COO and CFO within London advertising agencies to bring commercial credibility to conversations on culture and inclusion.
She leads clear, data driven discussions on race, gender and intersectionality, translating complex research into practical insight for leaders and organisations.
She works with global organisations including Apple, Amazon, Google, Barclays, the NHS and the UK Civil Service to deliver impactful keynotes, workshops and training.
She combines lived experience with research and cultural analysis to challenge thinking and drive more informed, inclusive decision making.
Her sessions equip leaders to understand workplace dynamics, communicate with confidence and build cultures that support diverse talent to succeed.

Videos of Sophie Williams

TED - The rigged test of leadership

Inclusive Publishing: part of Virtual Primadonna Festival 2020

BBC x Open University - Is Race a Myth?

Articles, Media & Podcasts

Podcast: Welcome to Successville

Books by Sophie Williams

The Glass Cliff

Millennial Black

Anti-Racist Ally

Comments & Testimonials

'Sophie's session was actually the highlight of the 3 day session ... we'll be in touch to book Sophie again, soon!'

Google

We really loved having Sophie at the conference, it was a highly relevant and insightful session and was incredibly well received by the audience who told us they found it impactful and thought provoking. We would highly recommend Sophie as a speaker and look forward to working with her in the future. We received some great feedback from our delegates who said it was a "Really positive approach to difficult issues and how to take action. The explanation of difficult topics were so helpful!”

NHS Confederation’s Health and Care Women Leaders Network

“By far the best presentation of the day - and indeed the conference. Very thought provoking and educational, in terms of understanding key concepts and indeed definitions. Sophie’s talk was a tour de force. It was a brilliant balance of facts and popular culture, which bought the topics to life and allowed us to engage with some tough content in an accessible way. We were given a framework to think about these topics differently and many attendees experienced an “epiphany” moment or two! We would thoroughly recommend Sophie for any audience wanting to explore these topics in an engaging, rigorous and honest way.'

Dept. of International Trade

“Sophie’s Anti-Racist Ally session with our Institution was AMAZING! Her candid and straight-forward style of speaking makes even the most skeptic less skeptical and more confident in their ability to be an Ally. She is not only helping us “meet people where they are” but is also equipping us to help move people’s “are” to a different and better place. Sophie is helping us eliminate excuses for not being Anti-Racist Allies. We are even more determined to take this from a ‘moment’ to a movement."

University of Central Florida

'Sophie was engaging and a joy to listen to. Her presentation style was relaxed whilst informative and completely accessible, including for colleagues who are new to these topics. The length and structure of the presentation as great, as was the content.'

Dogs Trust