About · Sarah Halfpenny
Sixteen years, six hundred events, one principle.
Events succeed when the people running them know exactly why they exist. Most don’t, until someone asks the question properly. That’s the work.
Photographed by Lucy Greene, London · spring 2026
events delivered, 2008–2026
countries on the road
industries — finance, pharma, tech, public
newsletter subscribers
principle, applied repeatedly
“Most of what makes a good events professional is unteachable in a classroom — but it’s all teachable in a room with someone who’s done it. That’s the work I’ve ended up doing, and the work I want to keep doing.”
A few things that aren’t on the CV.
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01
Lives in south London with a partner, two children and a mid-tempered dog called Friday.
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02
Trustee of a small charity that runs creative programmes for teenagers in care.
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03
Reads a lot of management writing from the 1970s, on the basis that the good ideas have already happened.
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04
Plays the piano badly and on purpose — the only hobby with no professional ambition attached.
How she works
Five things worth knowing before we start.
Direct, not difficult
If your event has a problem, I’ll tell you. I’ll also tell you what to do about it. The two come together — diagnosis without prescription is therapy, not consultancy.
Senior, in the room
Whichever piece of work we agree, you get me — not a junior with my deck. I keep the practice deliberately small for this reason.
Industry-agnostic
Finance, pharma, tech, public sector, charity. The five problems show up everywhere; the dressing changes.
Plain English
No frameworks-with-acronyms. No ‘thought partnership’. The brief, the diagnosis, the recommendation, the pricing — all in language a board can read.
Honest about fit
If your problem isn’t my work, I’ll say so on the discovery call and recommend three people who’d serve you better. I’d rather lose the fee than waste the quarter.
The principle
Events are the company, in a room.
Most companies treat events as a marketing line tactic. They are not. They are the only moment in a year when your customers, your people, your partners and your story all share the same air.
The events that work understand this. They are run by people who know what the company is trying to be, and who design every decision — agenda, room, supplier, briefing — back from that question. Most events skip it. That’s why most events feel the same.
My job, whichever way you work with me, is to make sure your team can ask that question and answer it well — under pressure, on a real timeline, with a real budget.
Elsewhere
Stages, pages and microphones.
A short, accurate list. For speaking enquiries the booking window is currently 4–6 months — get in early.
The arc
Sixteen years, in plain English.
Production assistant → producer
Cut my teeth on conferences for the financial services majors. Learned how a 1,200-delegate AGM is actually run when you’re the most junior person in the room.
Head of events, FTSE-listed plc
Owned the global events calendar for a listed business — investor days, customer summits, all-hands. Discovered I cared less about logistics and more about whether the events were actually saying anything.
Director, boutique events agency
Set up the strategy practice. Worked with FTSE 100, scale-ups, government and the third sector. Learned that the same five problems show up in every brief, regardless of sector.
Founder · Sarah Halfpenny Events
Mentoring, in-house training, consultancy. Picked the work I wanted to keep doing — sharpening the people who run events, rather than running events for them.
“Sarah doesn’t tell you what events should look like. She listens to what yours need to do, and then she’s brutally specific about how to get there.”
Tell me what you’re working on.
Whether it’s a discovery call about consultancy, a single mentoring session, or a quick question about training your team — replies come from Sarah directly, usually within a working day.