Vanessa Sturman helps busy leaders, teams, and athletes with practical and sustainable nutrition habits to support performance, resilience, and focus. She links personal performance, business performance, and planetary health. She is a frequent media contributor, including Sky News, BBC Radio, and other outlets. Her approach uses enjoyable, flavour-filled food and simple shifts that fit real life and culture. No restriction. No overwhelm. Just practical, evidence-based changes.
Vanessa’s work is grounded in the principle that the way we eat can support performance and resilience. Drawing on nutrition science, real-world experience, and cultural food knowledge, she supports busy people to thrive under pressure. In the UK, poor staff health and lost productivity cost businesses an estimated £100-138 billion each year.
Vanessa equips organisations with talks and practical tools that help teams manage their energy, maintain concentration, and work more consistently. Her approach bridges personal performance, business performance, and planetary wellbeing, showing how simple, culturally relevant shifts can support energy, focus, resilience, profitability, and planetary benefits. Her inclusive, accessible approach is shaped by her recovery from teenage binge eating, her experience as a person of colour raised by an immigrant mother who taught her the value of food, budgeting and waste reduction, and her professional background as a Sustainability and Behaviour Change Consultant.
Educated at Cambridge University in Social and Biological Anthropology (BA, MPhil, MA), Vanessa is a published recipe developer and experienced 1:1 coach. Her clients include Fulham Football Club, Cambridge University, Brooks Macdonald, and Octopus Electric Vehicles. She is a Health Expert for BBC Radio Oxfordshire and Berkshire and has won two prestigious awards from The Speaker Awards for her engaging, high-impact speaking delivery. Vanessa delivers keynotes, workshops, and panel sessions on leadership, small habit change, and adaptability under pressure, even within diverse food cultures, empowering teams to apply ideas immediately. She also runs energising team cooking sessions and is regularly booked for Mental Health Awareness events and corporate wellbeing weeks.
Vanessa Sturman's official speaking topics are listed below:
Fuel Your Leadership: Optimising Performance Through Nutrition and Simple Habits
- Discover how practical nutrition habits can help optimise your leadership skills, drive performance and help reduce feelings of burnout.
- Learn to avoid the pitfalls of neglecting your wellbeing and nutrition and how it affects your team, your business, and your overall quality of life.
- Uncover the simple yet powerful changes you can make within your busy lifestyle to help support your energy, concentration, and decision-making abilities.
Nourish Your Mind: Support Focus and Mental Wellbeing with Delicious Food
- Unlock the power of food to support your mental wellbeing and focus, without the burden of dieting or restriction.
- Learn how to make simple nutrition changes that help support concentration and everyday emotional wellbeing.
- Discover delicious and easy tweaks, and recipes, that can be incorporated into your busy schedule, and fit with your culture and favourite foods.
Sustainable Thriving: Delicious Nutrition for Performance and the Planet
- Explore the connection between personal performance, planetary impact and business performance.
- Learn how to make food choices that support your performance and concentration and contribute to a more sustainable future.
- Discover delicious, eco-conscious recipes that are kind to your taste buds, the environment and fit with your culture.
Eat to Thrive: Nutrition Habits for Women's Performance and Vitality
- Explore how nutrition habits can support wellbeing and vitality across life stages.
- Explore simple food choices and habits supporting energy, focus, and resilience for women in busy lives.
- Discover delicious, practical recipes fitting your culture and schedule.
The Compound Effect of Everyday Nutrition Choices: Building Resilience for the Long Term
- Learn why quick fixes fail and how to break free from the cycle of short-term fads that can grip people and impact productivity.
- Discover how small, consistent food choices can help build sustainable habits that support energy, focus and performance for your teams and leaders.
- Uncover practical, sustainable strategies to build resilience and make day-to-day living feel easier over the long term.
Official Feedback from In-Person & Virtual Events
Feedback from In-Person Events:
"Vanessa is a fantastic speaker. Promised us she'd get people thinking about their food choices in an approachable manner, and surpassed expectations." - Dr Charlie Barty-King, Sustainability Lead
"Vanessa is a superb health coach, and I can see why she's an award-winning speaker. The feedback I got from our audience of nearly 200 people was very complimentary. They found her to be very supportive, compassionate and focused on individual problems when following up." - Bhik, Clinical Professor
“Vanessa is one of the most positive and knowledgeable speakers we’ve had.” - SuperCharger Ventures
“Vanessa exceeded our expectations in getting people to think about their food choices.” - Cambridge University
“Fantastic speaker. A pleasure to work with and has bags of enthusiasm and passion for nutrition.” - Anjay, Account Manager, Nokamo
“Vanessa was an excellent speaker, she had a natural charm and enthusiasm during eh discussion. Her practical tips really captivated the audience.” - Victoria, Brand Manager, Whitworths.
“Vanessa is a fabulous contributor to any programme. She’s so enthusiastic and knowledgeable about all things nutrition. Vanessa is super reliable and is a true joy!” - Lauren, Senior BBC Breakfast Producer
“Vanessa’s enthusiasm and deep subject matter knowledge really stood out, creating an engaging session. The content was well received by our participants, who were all excited to try some of the different food ideas, inspired and motivated to make the simple changes for a healthier lifestyle. We hope to work with Vanessa again soon!” - Summer, HR Coordinator, Q5
"Vanessa is one of the most positive, helpful and knowledgeable speakers that we have had in our physical accelerator in Malta. Her experience of bridging personal wellbeing and the health of your business is a must-have for any startup." - Iusef, Founder, The Hub in Malta
"My entire team at MSU - College of Human Medicine was impressed with her and the students still ask questions regarding her content. I highly recommend Vanessa" - Marcus, Medical Professor, Michigan State University
Feedback from Virtual Events:
"Vanessa delivered a very insightful and engaging webinar for FFC staff on how small food habits can boost personal energy and environmental sustainability. Her passion and expertise made the session both inspiring and full of actionable takeaways. Highly recommended!" - Tim, Head of Strategy & Insights, Fulham Football Club
"A really lively and engaging session that was very well-received. I’m delighted to see that we have colleagues joining from the US and Mexico, too. Such great tips for our people!" - Lisa, Learning & Development Lead, Cambridge University Press
- 2025 – Multi-Award-Winning Speaker, including Virtual Speaker of the Year (highly commended)
- 2024 – Selected as a Health Expert for BBC Radio Oxfordshire and Berkshire
- 2024 – Fulham Football Club added to the list of clients
- 2023 – On the Board of Advisors, Food Facts (tackling misinformation in nutrition and the media)
- 2023 – Award-Winning Speaker in Positive Impact & Sustainability
- 2022 – Featured regularly in the media, including The Guardian, The Mirror Online, Daily Star, Holland & Barrett Magazine, Stylist, Metro, Sky News, BBC Radio, LBC
- 2022 – Nutrition Lead for FinWell
- 2022 – Speaker for Cambridge University and the Francis Crick Institute
- 2021 – Regular speaker for academic, corporate, and public events on healthy habits, food systems, sustainable health, and workplace performance
- 2016 – Founded a recipe & food education platform
- 2016 – Became a Change Management and Behaviour Change Consultant
- 2011 – Sustainability Consultant, including authoring a published paper with WWF-UK
- 2009 – MPhil, Applied Biological Anthropology, Cambridge University
- 2008 – BA, Social Anthropology, Cambridge University
How to hire Vanessa Sturman
Contact the Champions Speakers Agency to provisionally enquire about hiring Vanessa Sturman for your next event, today. To get in touch, simply call an official booking agent on 0207 1010 553 or email us at [email protected] for more information.
** We do NOT accept requests for autographs, signed merchandise, fan mail, birthday messages or any other non-commercial contact with the speakers or acts. Each speaker on the website may not have necessarily worked with Champions in the past but are known to perform such engagements within the industry.
