Available to book
John Lees
Personal Branding
Growth Mindset
Employee Engagement
Transform career management and talent retention with John Lees, UK's leading career strategist. John equips professionals to navigate workplace transitions and make strategic career decisions. Author of 15 books including the bestselling How To Get A Job You Love, he has worked with CIPD, Lloyds Banking Group, and The British Council.
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Author
John Lees is the UK's leading career strategist, helping professionals navigate career transitions with practical, innovative approaches that blend deep expertise with accessible guidance.
As the author of 15 career books, including the bestseller How To Get A Job You Love (twice selected as WHSmith Business Book of the Month), John brings substantial credibility to his work. His career insights appear regularly in Harvard Business Review online, The Times, and The Guardian, while his television appearances include BBC and ITV programmes focused on employment success.
John equips organisations to address critical talent challenges through specialised programmes that transform career management practices. His corporate work spans major institutions, including The British Council, CIPD, Lloyds Banking Group, and Marks & Spencer, where he develops frameworks for career realignment, structured career conversations, and talent retention strategies that respond to today's rapidly evolving workplace demands.
Audiences leave John's presentations with practical tools to make better career decisions, actionable strategies to overcome career barriers, and renewed confidence to pursue meaningful work aligned with their strengths and values.
Book John Lees to give your team the career clarity and strategic direction they need to thrive in today's complex professional landscape.
Topics, sessions and talks
John Lees emphasises the importance of taking control of your career in today's evolving work environment. He discusses managing the next 18 months of your professional life, assessing your learning curve, and identifying key career drivers. Attendees will learn how to map their organisation to uncover missed opportunities, recognise transferable skills, and connect authentically through impactful storytelling. Ultimately, participants will gain insights into how to effectively communicate their value and navigate their career paths.
John Lees will guide attendees in understanding career decision-making by identifying personal career drivers and motivations. He will emphasise the importance of aligning individual strengths with organisational needs and building essential relationships. Participants will learn to effectively communicate their energy and strengths authentically, without feeling disingenuous. Additionally, John will share strategies for influencing others, seeking mentorship, and gathering support within their organisations. Attendees will leave equipped with practical tools for advancing their careers.
In this talk, John Lees addresses the challenges of self-promotion and career uncertainty. He emphasises the importance of resilience and offers strategies for protecting it. Attendees will learn the career two-step, which combines reflection and action, and discover tools from positive psychology to enhance confidence. John also explores innovative networking techniques and authentic communication, teaching participants how to effectively convey their strengths and share energising stories. By the end, attendees will feel empowered to navigate their career paths with clarity.
In this talk, John Lees explores how to effectively communicate your skills and achievements without coming across as exaggerated or aggressive. He covers the essentials of managing structured career conversations, what to prepare beforehand, and how to address career anxieties when feeling unchallenged in your role. Attendees will learn strategies for requesting difficult changes and how to present constructive plans during appraisals, equipping them with the tools to navigate their career discussions confidently.
John Lees, the UK's leading career strategist and author of 15 career books, delivers transformative presentations that equip professionals with practical tools for making better career decisions and overcoming workplace barriers. Book John to give your team the career clarity and strategic direction they need to thrive in today's complex professional landscape.
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frequently asked questions
Something we've not covered here?
Email john.lees@getapeptalk.com or call PepTalk on +44 20 3835 2929 (UK) or +1 737 888 5112 (US), and one of our speaker agents will contact you within hours to confirm John's availability and fees. If you can, please include your budget upfront – it helps us fast-track your request. It’s also helpful to know the date, format (virtual or in-person), location, and a bit about your audience.
John Lees structures his sessions around a reflective-then-active framework he calls the "career two-step," pairing self-assessment exercises (identifying personal career drivers, mapping transferable skills) with outward-facing communication techniques, including the construction of energising stories that participants use to convey their strengths to colleagues and decision-makers.
John Lees specialises in career management, confidence and resilience, and transferable skills communication, drawing on themes of career decision-making, authentic self-promotion, and organisational navigation. He is the author of 15 career books, including How To Get A Job You Love, twice selected as WHSmith Business Book of the Month, with career insights published regularly in Harvard Business Review, The Times, and The Guardian.
No. PepTalk adds no booking fee, so you pay the speaker's fee and nothing beyond it. The service, from shortlist through to contracts and event-day logistics, is included. For repeat or multi-event bookings, PepTalk can agree preferential rates with your procurement team.
Share your event date, audience, format, objectives and budget, and PepTalk sends a hand-picked shortlist within 24 hours. Each suggestion comes with a profile, a fee and a recommendation on the strongest fit. Once you choose, PepTalk handles contracts, travel and logistics through to event day.
The typical fee range is the speaker's standard in-person fee in their home market, shown in their local currency. It moves with format, location, date and session length: virtual sessions and shorter slots usually cost less, while international travel and peak dates cost more. Send your brief to PepTalk and the team will confirm the exact fee in your currency.
Not all of them, and it makes no difference to your booking. PepTalk's network of 15,000+ speakers covers talent the team works with directly alongside speakers represented by agents and agencies worldwide. PepTalk approaches the speaker, negotiates the fee and handles contracting either way.
Three to six months ahead is comfortable for most events, and 12 months is better for large conferences, peak-season dates or one specific in-demand speaker. Shorter timelines are workable, and PepTalk regularly fills last-minute and replacement bookings within days. Availability is the constraint, so get in touch as soon as you have a date.
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