Speaker

Ted has delivered keynote speeches to audiences of 1,800 people, conducted workshops for twelve, and addresses every group size in between.

What Most Leaders Miss

An excerpt from a conference speech in which Ted highlights one of the key attributes of successful leaders — one that is rarely discussed or written about.

We Conserve Mental Energy

An excerpt from a conference speech in which Ted discusses the traps that await us when we confront complex problems of any kind.

The following presentations can be customized for any size of gathering, as keynotes or as interactive workshops.

Leadership

The Missing Ingredient in 21st-Century Leadership

The missing ingredient for many leaders is the ability to orchestrate productive team dialogue. How? By leveraging cognitive diversity. How? By fostering constructive dissent. Today’s leader must be the Chief Conversation Facilitator.

Group Decision-Making

Avoiding the Three Pitfalls of Team Discussion

All team meetings, from departmental meetings to board strategic offsites, are vulnerable to three pitfalls when individuals assemble to interact: group polarization, group think, and path dependence. A group ignores these traps at their peril.

Problem Solving

The Three Reasons We Mess Up

More than ever, we need to ramp up the complexity of our thinking to match the complexity of our challenges. We do this by correcting for our three self-sabotaging tendencies: oversimplifying, overconfidence, and over-reacting.

Hard to Be Human

The Five Design Flaws of Modern Homo Sapiens

What is unique about being human? The five big design flaws that make human life harder than it needs to be. And five big workarounds that fix these flaws.

Meaning-Seeking

Finding Value in Our Lives

Only humans need “meaning” but this need is not easily met. Philosophers and psychologists have wrestled with existential angst and come up with some very powerful insights and solutions.

“Your keynote was identified in evaluations as one of the top 3 highlights of our conference, with comments such as ‘very inspiring’ and ‘perfect opener.’”

Robert P. Taylor, PhD, CEO of the Institute of Public Administration of Canada

 

“Ted brought insights in a compelling presentation that provided practical steps leaders can take.”

John Brewer, Director, The Conference Board of Canada

 

“Ted’s speech provided very illuminating insight into cutting-edge research, as evidenced by the extended Q&A.”

Chris MacDonald, PhD, Director of Ted Rogers Leadership Centre at Toronto Metropolitan University