In a corporate meeting room, a mentorship group of four women sit at a table listening to the mentor and facilitator, Diana Squires. She sits on the right, wearing a business-casual shirt and using her hands to explain a concept.

Strategist and storyteller for charities and companies in the UK and beyond

Consultant

Take your strategy to the next level by teaming up with a laser-focused, innovative problem-solver. My experience spans social impact mapping, multi-year strategic planning, user research and personas, programme design, and published academic works.
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Speaker

Audiences respond to an engaging, personable storyteller. I have spoken at conferences, webinars, university symposiums, and on podcasts. I thrive in keynotes and panel moderation alike, and my public speaking workshop has helped local and international teams to upskill.
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Facilitator

My approach can make sense of the chaos, galvanise teams to increase their impact, or bring people together for powerful idea generation and development. In person, online, and hybrid, I have helped fuel the progress of hyper-local charity Boards, Big Four consultants, and everything in between.
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About Me

A strategic driver of impact and organisational change, I work across the social sector and higher education, with select corporate collaborations. My approach is pro-innovation, which means I lean in with curiosity and push everyone’s thinking in new directions. To every problem, there is at least one creative solution – and probably several! I’m here to help you find them.

Over 20 years of leading social impact programmes, I have built a reputation for leaving an organisation better than I found it. This has looked like scaling-up programmes (7x the frequency is my record), increasing staff diversity and retention, making teams more efficient, and exceeding revenue projections (ROI of 3 in higher education fundraising and 3x the income target in charity fundraising). A charity Trustee at Choices and former Executive Board Member at Bayes Business School, I believe volunteering goes hand-in-hand with my work.

You can engage me as a sounding board and critical friend, strategy partner, inspiring speaker, researcher, or group facilitator. If you’d like to increase your impact, expand your innovation potential, or make your organisation more resilient, let’s talk.

Lifelong learning:

MSc Innovation, Creativity and Leadership: Bayes Business School, London
Trustee Essentials: ICAEW
Social Impact Analysis & Theory of Change: Acumen Academy
Coaching for Personal and Professional Excellence: Marriott Management Group
Leadership Communication: Canadian Professional Management Services
Methods of Positive Influence & Persuasion: Trinity Western University
Social Impact Award: City St. George’s, University of London
Beta Gamma Sigma member: offered to top 10% of Business School graduates
WSET Level 1: shall we integrate some thoughtful wine pairings into our event?

"Diana has challenged me to be a better leader in so many ways. She sees other perspectives that I often miss. She also notices ways that our organisation could grow and develop in order to lighten the load on staff and volunteers. We are now more efficient."

Jenny Shantz
Executive Director at Inner Hope
"Diana is a gem. A rare talent that brings vision, passion and a high work ethic to her projects. Every project that Diana touched had a bright outcome. Her dependability for a high level of excellence is very hard to find."

Scott Fehrenbacher
CEO, Higher Education sector
"Diana Squires' diverse career in creative leadership, from programme design and direction, to theatre management, marketing and media brought a rich diversity of thought to her work as a design consultant. She led on user testing across several important prototypes, market research, and developed strong relationships with our clients."

Sam Steele
NED and Entrepreneur in Residence at CityVentures
"Diana is a great asset to the Executive Board. Committed, thorough, hard-working, and a highly effective communicator. She has innovative ideas and infectious enthusiasm!"

Alison Maitland
Author, Leadership Coach, and Board Chair at the Global Women’s Leadership Programme
"Diana has a rare talent for making strategic conversations feel accessible, purposeful and human. She is thoughtful, inclusive and impactful. I would wholeheartedly recommend her to anyone looking for an exceptional speaker and facilitator who can bring people together around meaningful change."

Angela Halliday
Director of Social Impact for UK & Ireland, Sodexo
As a trustee at Choices, we really value her impressive ability to think clearly through an issue from many angles and ask all the right, challenging, questions. Diana’s knowledge of the charity sector landscape is also extremely valuable and helps guide the board’s decision-making."t Item

Sophie Guthrie-Kummer
CEO, Choices
"Having Diana as a supervisor has been incredible. She cares about seeing a team thrive, and has the technical and interpersonal skills to get them there."

Samantha Hers
Registered Clinical Counsellor

Strategist and storyteller for charities and companies in the UK and beyond

Consultant

Speaker

Facilitator

About Me

"Diana has challenged me to be a better leader in so many ways. She sees other perspectives that I often miss. She also notices ways that our organisation could grow and develop in order to lighten the load on staff and volunteers. We are now more efficient."

"Diana is a gem. A rare talent that brings vision, passion and a high work ethic to her projects. Every project that Diana touched had a bright outcome. Her dependability for a high level of excellence is very hard to find."

"Diana is a great asset to the Executive Board. Committed, thorough, hard-working, and a highly effective communicator. She has innovative ideas and infectious enthusiasm!"

"Diana has a rare talent for making strategic conversations feel accessible, purposeful and human. She is thoughtful, inclusive and impactful. I would wholeheartedly recommend her to anyone looking for an exceptional speaker and facilitator who can bring people together around meaningful change."

As a trustee at Choices, we really value her impressive ability to think clearly through an issue from many angles and ask all the right, challenging, questions. Diana’s knowledge of the charity sector landscape is also extremely valuable and helps guide the board’s decision-making."t Item

"Having Diana as a supervisor has been incredible. She cares about seeing a team thrive, and has the technical and interpersonal skills to get them there."

Organisations I’ve Worked With