Katie Matthews-Furphy
Katie is a 32-year-old, multi-award-winning disabled entrepreneur, educator, speaker, trauma-informed practitioner, and global mental health trainer.
Katie has 15 years lived/living experience with mental illness, with eclectic passions including supporting other’s mental health, inclusive entrepreneurship, female leadership, community development, growth mindset development and supporting young people.
Katie established her first business aged 23 after graduating from Queen’s University Belfast and has since founded four businesses and two voluntary organisations. She spent 4 years as an Independent Member of the ABC Area Policing Community Safety Partnership, is a member of the UK’s All-Party Parliamentary Group for Disability and is the delivery partner for Northern Ireland's first Council-led Inclusive Enterprise Pathway, designed and delivered on behalf of Belfast City Council’s.
She spent 3 years as the Northern Ireland National Director for the Global Entrepreneurship Network UK, was a regional Judge and Chair for The Diana Award 2020 & 2021, a Judge for the National Start-Up Awards 2023 & 2024, Chair of Pure Mental NI, a Judge for the Go Succeed "The Ultimate Pitch" Competition and was the UK Director for Global Entrepreneurship Week UK 2022.
She was honoured to be listed on Belfast Telegraph’s NI 30 Under 30 List 2022, the Diverse In’s “130 Women who Break the Bias” List 2022, and the f:entrepreneur UK Top 100 Female Entrepreneurs List 2022.
Further accolades include winning NI Young Business Person of the Year in both 2021 and 2022 at the Belfast Telegraph Business Awards, NI Young Leader of the Year in 2022 at the NI Young Leaders Awards and NI Young Achiever of the Year in 2023 at the NI Women’s Awards.
Most recently she received the award for Best Mental Health and Wellbeing Trainer NI 2024.
Katie is a qualified Mental Health First Aid Trainer with the Public Health Agency, a trained mindfulness instructor, Level 3 Mental Health First Aider, Youth Mental Health First Aider, Hopeful Minds Facilitator, ASIST Trained (Applied Suicide Intervention Skills), "Take 5" & "Gimme 5" Well-Being Ambassador for the Public Health Agency NI.