Available to book
Poorna Bell
Adversity
Resilience
Gender Equality
Transform workplace wellbeing and inclusive leadership with Poorna Bell, award-winning journalist, author, and mental health advocate. Poorna works with organisations like Spotify, Meta and NHS to build mental resilience strategies and create inclusive environments. Winner of The Sunday Times' Sports Performance Book of the Year award.
Inspirational Female
Workshop Facilitators
International Women's Day
Female Empowerment
Self Improvement
Personal Wellbeing
Event Hosts
Journalist
Mindset
Inclusion
Sport
Author
Influencer
Philanthropy
Inspirational
Mental Health Awareness
Poorna Bell is an award-winning journalist, author, and powerlifter whose work champions mental health advocacy, women's empowerment, and inclusive fitness. Her unique blend of personal experience and professional expertise offers authentic perspectives on resilience and strength.
A former UK Executive Editor for HuffPost, Poorna has authored five acclaimed books, including Chase the Rainbow, Stronger (which was named Sports Performance Book of the Year by The Sunday Times), and her novels In Case of Emergency and This Is Fine. She also founded See My Strong, a platform celebrating diverse women in fitness, and serves as an ambassador for suicide prevention charity CALM.
A dynamic and insightful speaker, Poorna has delivered keynotes and hosted events for organisations including Spotify, Meta, Twitter, Ernst & Young, Moët Hennessy, and The Financial Times, as well as NHS mental health summits. Trained in presentation at RADA, she helps organisations navigate complex challenges through her keynotes on mental resilience, inclusive leadership, and authentic storytelling. Her work with Spotify, Meta, NatWest, and the NHS demonstrates her ability to translate personal insights into actionable strategies for workplace wellbeing and cultural transformation. Audiences leave Poorna's presentations with practical tools for building mental resilience, frameworks for creating inclusive environments, and inspiration to embrace vulnerability as a leadership strength.
Book Poorna for a transformative experience that combines journalistic insight with the hard-earned wisdom of someone who has turned personal challenges into professional purpose.
Topics, sessions and talks
Poorna Bell draws on deeply personal experiences of loss, identity, and renewal to explore what true resilience looks like. From navigating racial intolerance after moving from India to the UK, to rebuilding her life following the death of her husband, Poorna shares how vulnerability and strength can coexist. Through her journey into powerlifting, she illustrates how finding physical strength transformed her mental and emotional wellbeing, offering powerful lessons in courage and reinvention.
Through a compelling blend of honesty and insight, Poorna Bell charts her journey from grief to empowerment. After her husband’s passing, she turned to physical strength training, discovering confidence, resilience, and a renewed sense of purpose. Her story challenges outdated perceptions of fragility and highlights the transformative impact of strength, both mental and physical, on identity and self-belief. This talk inspires audiences to embrace adversity as a catalyst for growth and authentic empowerment.
Poorna Bell challenges cultural narratives that confine women’s physical and emotional power. Building on themes from her award-winning book Stronger, she reveals how embracing strength, beyond appearance, can transform confidence, connection, and leadership. Her approach blends storytelling, social insight, and humour, inviting audiences to rethink the relationship between body and identity. Through her message, she encourages women to claim space, break free from limitation, and discover strength as a source of freedom and community.
Poorna Bell examines the barriers that continue to shape women’s experiences in leadership, from internalised self-doubt to systemic inequality. Drawing from two decades in journalism and advocacy, she unpacks how women can cultivate confidence, self-advocacy, and collective support to thrive in modern workplaces. Combining practical insight with lived experience, Poorna’s engaging and candid approach encourages audiences to lead with purpose, build resilience, and redefine success on their own terms.
Poorna Bell's powerful blend of award-winning journalism, mental health advocacy, and inclusive fitness expertise equips organisations with actionable strategies for resilience, wellbeing, and cultural transformation. Book this transformative speaker to provide your team with practical tools for mental resilience and inclusive leadership, delivered with the clarity and impact that has already impressed organisations like Spotify, Meta, and the NHS.
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frequently asked questions
Something we've not covered here?
To book Poorna Bell, email poorna.bell@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 Poorna's availability and speaking fee. 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 about your audience.
Poorna Bell uses autobiographical narrative as her primary format, structuring talks around her own lived experiences — including bereavement, racial identity, and entry into competitive powerlifting — to draw out broader lessons on resilience, identity, and empowerment.
Poorna Bell speaks on resilience and personal reinvention, grief and identity, and the relationship between physical strength and mental wellbeing. Her book Stronger was named Sports Performance Book of the Year by The Sunday Times, and she is a former UK Executive Editor at HuffPost with five published books to her name.
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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