Doug Manuel

Doug Manuel is a motivational speaker, workshop leader and musician with a deep understanding of business processes and dynamics and a special talent for bringing people together, fostering connections and establishing true collaboration.

To meet the challenges of our times, his impact talks and interactive experiences are designed to energize and keep people connected at both virtual or hybrid as well as live events.

He has an extraordinary ability to read and feel into his audiences and connect with them even from afar. With his natural empathy and deep understanding of the human being, he guides them to a place of active listening, building up emotions and energy: the ideal opener to any event format and the perfect re-energizer and connector throughout the programme.

As we continue with our hybrid ways of working, talent acquisition and retention has become our biggest challenge.

The lack of meaningful human connection remains the primary reason for disengaged and fragmented teams.

Teams need to be re-united, re-motivated with a renewed sense of purpose so that productivity can once again soar.

Doug Manuel | Collaboration Expert 

As someone who has been actively engaging audiences for nearly 3 decades through his keynotes, British speaker and trainer Doug Manuel can help you build a culture of purpose driven engagement and collaboration.

Delivering meaningful, energizing and motivating experiences that enhance collaboration, he will leave your team equipped with the tools they need to ensure more productivity, and better business results.

When you have the opportunity for your people to once again come together, there is a need to connect, interact, collaborate, learn and be inspired to act on the challenges of a changed world. Doug Manuel will enliven your audience with his unique style and combination of techniques covering topics from empathy and resilience to purpose and collaboration.

If you want to focus on Leadership Development and Team Building, look no further for experiences that inspire interaction – and action! Doug will help teams and leaders challenge preconceptions and break down barriers. 

If you are looking for a unique and ground breaking experience, find out how Doug uses music to motivate, unite, and energise a whole audience.

Doug has collaborated with multinationals, sports teams, leading business schools and NGOs around the globe – not to mention TEDx, TED Global and Oprah Winfrey. In his keynote speeches, workshops and breakout sessions he uses stories, music, and rhythm to boost energy, break down barriers and create an interactive, multi-sensory experience.

Delivered in his native English or fluent French, Doug Manuel’s presentations have a lasting impact on audiences large or small. In 1995, Doug Manuel attended a drumming workshop and his love of Africa was born.

The following year he set off for the mother continent to film elephants for a BBC documentary, and to West Africa to study the music of the Djembe. Doug Manuel eventually gave up his career as a BBC documentary producer to pursue and share his passion for West African culture and the Djembe drum, and to focus on his personal development work and extensive coaching.

During this journey, he acquired the skills, insights and understanding which today enable him to empower people to connect with themselves, each other and their work. Although the process began with the Djembe, over the years it has evolved exponentially.

Doug’s keynote ‘The Soul of Business’ now focuses on the whole picture with a key focus on the values of West African culture and introduces key excerpts of his new documentary ‘Beats As One’. Through his extensive travels across Africa and his experience as a filmmaker, Doug has become an expert in diversity, equity, and inclusion.

With a strong focus on empathy, his topics range from resilience to help embrace change, enhancing purpose and collaboration to drive success, developing leadership and personal growth to expand careers, through to mindfulness and managing stress to overcome challenges.

Delivered in leading business schools and Fortune 500 companies, Leadership Development and Team Building are the focus of Doug’s much-praised interactive workshops and live learning laboratories.

Leading by example, he generously shares his expertise and personal techniques to bring out the best in teams and put leadership theory into action.

As well as running leadership retreats in West Africa Doug Manuel also leads his charity ‘Lighting Up Lives’, whose pilot project partners with the villagers of Abéné in Senegal, inspiring and supporting local action to solve local problems such as energy, health, sanitation and education.

The charity builds bridges between Africa and the occident, fostering collaboration and putting words into action.

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