Leo van Woerden is a neuroscientist with 25 years of experience. He shows organisations how sleep, stress and recovery decide whether the brain stays sharp under pressure. Science, made tangible with drums.
TRUSTED BY
The load keeps rising, the recovery time doesn’t. More coming at you, higher expectations, shorter nights. Mistakes, absence and lost focus rarely come from a lack of knowledge or effort. They come from a brain that no longer switches between effort and recovery.
employees report work-related burnout complaints.
Sources: NEA (CBS/TNO, 2024) · Dawson & Reid (Nature, 1997) · TNO Arbobalans 2025 (Netherlands)
The brain switches continuously between action and recovery. Most people don’t know what that switching does, or why it goes wrong.
“I separate fact from fable and turn what happens in the brain into something you do differently tomorrow.”
— Leo
A culture shift has taken hold, where things that affect vitality can finally be talked about. Even the most critical audience is won over by the way you lay out the science and take apart the myths people cling to.
Via drumming he illustrated scientific points in a clear and memorable way. Leo inspired me, and I think many others in the audience, to look carefully into our sleep and general lifestyle habits.
Sleep is the foundation we all run on. Leo helps you make that foundation solid. I’d recommend him to anyone who wants to make a difference from a position of strength.
Just as fun and engaging as a day racing on the track, because I immediately felt how I could improve my life.
We asked Leo to speak to a group of PhD candidates. An inspiring, popular-science talk on sleep; the expression of rhythms on the drum was received very positively.
You can hear things often, but to truly understand them it's important to experience them yourself. That's what makes Leo's presentation so special.
Leo on stage opens eyes and creates buy-in across a large group, energetic and scientifically clear, with rhythmic elements that make brain mechanisms tangible.
In a workshop people practise and turn understanding into routines that fit the working day. Combine several into a tailored programme with recurring online coaching, and a keynote where it helps, so the change keeps living between sessions.
You train your own coaches and leaders to guide colleagues on sleep, stress, recovery and behaviour, so the knowledge stays and is carried internally long after Leo leaves. Neuroscience, coaching skills and behaviour change in one framework.
Every keynote and workshop can be tailored to your sector and question. These are the topics Leo is asked for most often, and the list is not closed: if your question is about how the brain holds up under pressure, there is usually something to build. Please don’t hesitate to reach out.
Why seven hours of sleep can still leave you tired, and how recovery is the foundation under sharpness and decision quality.
What stress does neurobiologically, why your own judgement of it declines, and how people learn to steer their stress response.
Sleeping ahead, power naps, caffeine, light and recovery for people who work nights or are on call. Workable adjustments to the rosters that already exist.
How capacity is built, why some people recover better than others, and how to guard the limit without playing down the pressure.
What happens neurobiologically after serious incidents, and how an organisation makes that discussable. The aim is recognition and understanding, not therapy.
The limiting factor sits in the brain working with the technology. Which human capacities weigh heaviest in an AI era, and how to strengthen them.
Fatigue and stress colour a leader’s judgement, usually without them noticing. Also available as a closed session for a board or management team.
Tunnel vision, escalating too late and holding on to the first impression are brain mechanisms. They can be understood and partly trained.
Movement as an instrument for stress regulation and mental clarity, provided it is used at the right moment. Including the pitfall: training at the wrong time works against recovery.
How nutrition, blood sugar and meal timing carry through into energy and concentration, without rigid diet rules. With attention to irregular shifts.
Behaviour change rarely fails for lack of motivation, but because of a wrong understanding of how habits work. Small steps that hold up under pressure too.
How the brain focuses, why it is so easily distracted, and which habits deliver the most gain.
You don’t need a specific question. Tell Leo what’s going on, or what you’re wondering about, and he’ll help you work out what fits. However the conversation goes, you’ll leave with something useful.
Your details are only used to answer your message.
A solid neuroscientific base, no neuro-hype, convincing even to the most critical audience.
People understand why they get stuck and what recovery means. That understanding is the basis for real, lasting change.
Drums and rhythmic exercises make abstract brain processes tangible. People understand and experience how their brain works.
Deployed at safety regions, fire services, hospitals (AMC, UMC, Tergooi) and companies like Proximus, Jobtrans and TenneT.
Not just inspiration, but routines and tools people keep up, because they want to, not because they have to.
Leo van Woerden studied neuroscience at VU Amsterdam and twenty-five years of research experience stress, sleep and performing under pressure. His own experience with ADHD became the engine behind his central question: behaviour only changes once people understand how their brain works.
He works where a mistake has immediate consequences. Safety regions, the Dutch armed forces, hospitals and utilities, and the leaders who run those teams.
As a drummer he makes brainwaves and rhythm tangible on stage: strictly science-based, sharp and funny. Even when the answer is uncomfortable.
Articles and talks on sleep, stress, recovery and the brain under pressure, in plain language and grounded in research. New pieces are added regularly.
The time had finally come again. After a period of living as a landlubber, a sailing holiday was on the schedule once more. This was a trip with
Why vitality in the workplace? A healthy and energetic work environment is essential for employee well-being and the growth of the company. Hire me as a speaker and
What is vitality in the workplace? Vitality in the workplace is about employees who feel energetic, motivated and healthy, which leads to better performance and a positive atmosphere.
Sign up for Leo’s newsletter and get the free guide. After that, the occasional update from Leo on what neuroscience can do for your life and your organisation.
Alongside his work for organisations, Leo shares his knowledge in accessible online courses and a free guide, for anyone who wants to work on better sleep, more energy and less stress.
Leo van Woerden is a neuroscientist who studied at VU Amsterdam and has spent 25 years researching sleep, stress and how people perform under pressure. He works as a keynote speaker and workshop facilitator for organisations where a lapse in focus has real consequences: safety regions, the Dutch armed forces, hospitals and utilities. He is also a drummer, and he uses rhythm on stage to make brain mechanisms audible rather than only described. His own experience with ADHD is where the work started, and it became the central idea: behaviour changes once people understand how their brain actually works.
Sleep, stress and recovery are the most requested topics, and they run underneath all the others. The full list covers mental resilience, decision-making under pressure, psychological load after serious incidents, leadership, nutrition, movement, focus, sleeping around irregular shifts, and how the human brain holds up alongside AI. Every topic works as a keynote for a large group or as a workshop for a team, with the examples rebuilt around your sector.
That is usually fine. The topics listed are the most requested ones, not a closed catalogue. If your question is about how people function under load, there is normally something to build. Tell us what is going on and you will hear straight away whether it fits. If it doesn’t, you will hear that too.
Most of his work sits in sectors where tired people make expensive mistakes: safety regions and fire services, hospitals, transport and logistics, critical infrastructure and the Dutch armed forces. Alongside that he speaks for corporate teams, boards and conferences. Clients include NIPV, UMC Utrecht, Proximus, TenneT and Bidfood. The mechanisms are the same in every sector. The examples are not.
A keynote is the starting point, 45 to 90 minutes for a large group, to get everyone to the same understanding at the same moment. A workshop is where that understanding becomes routine, in a smaller group that works with its own rosters and its own week. The vitality-coach training is for organisations that want to keep the knowledge in house and certify their own coaches and leaders. Most organisations start with a keynote and decide afterwards. If you are not sure, don’t choose yet; a short call usually settles it.
That is the audience it is built for. Firefighters, military personnel, medical teams and operational leaders do not go along with a good story, and those are the rooms Leo stands in most often. What works there is evidence you can check for yourself, and being told plainly when the research does not support a popular claim. The quotes further down this page come from exactly those rooms.
Leo works in Dutch and English, so a Dutch team, an international audience and a mixed room are all straightforward. Live on stage is where the drums do their work, but keynotes and workshops also run online for teams spread across locations. Keynotes are given inside and outside the Netherlands.
Every booking starts with a conversation: who is in the room, what is going on, and why the question is being asked now. Where it helps, Leo speaks to a few participants beforehand. After that the examples, the exercises and the emphasis move with the sector. For a safety region that means callouts, night alarms and the day after. For a board it means decision-making and a diary that never empties. What does not move is the science underneath.
There is no price list, because requests differ in group size, travel, number of sessions and preparation. You get a proposal with a clear figure before anything is agreed. One practical note on budget: this is more often paid from safety, training or operations than from a wellbeing budget, because the case is about reliability and error rates rather than perks.
For a fixed date in autumn or around a conference, a few months is sensible. For a single team day, shorter notice often works. If you are still deciding internally, say so early; you will at least know whether the date is still open.
