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Heather McGowan

Future of Work Strategist | Thought Leader | Researcher | Author

Speaker's Fee Range : $30,000 - $50,000
Travels From :   MA

  Topics

Change Disruption Technology / IT Innovation Strategic Planning Education Future Trends Best-Selling Author Workforce Virtual Presentat... Leadership Diversity, Equity... Empowerment Employee Engageme... Corporate Culture

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  Heather McGowan Profile

Future-of-work strategist Heather E. McGowan helps leaders prepare their people and organizations for the Augmented Era– where the greatest competitive advantage comes from optimizing human performance. McGowan is a sense maker, a dot connector, a deep thinker, and a pattern matcher who sees things that others miss.

Heather gives people the courage and insight that illuminates their path forward. She's transforming mindsets and entire organizations around the globe with her message about how the next phase of work will focus on continuous learning, rather than simply learning once in order to work. Pulitzer Prize–winning NYT columnist Thomas Friedman frequently quotes Heather in his books and columns and describes her as "the oasis" when it comes to insights into the future of work. In 2020 Heather was recognized as one of the top 50 female futurists in the world by Forbes. Heather's sessions help employees and leaders alike prepare for and adapt to jobs that do not yet exist.

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Heather McGowan Profile
Future-of-work strategist Heather E. McGowan helps leaders prepare their people and organizations for the Augmented Era– where the greatest competitive advantage comes from optimizing human performance. McGowan is a sense maker, a dot connector, a deep thinker, and a pattern matcher who sees things that others miss.

Heather gives people the courage and insight that illuminates their path forward. She's transforming mindsets and entire organizations around the globe with her message about how the next phase of work will focus on continuous learning, rather than simply learning once in order to work. Pulitzer Prize–winning NYT columnist Thomas Friedman frequently quotes Heather in his books and columns and describes her as "the oasis" when it comes to insights into the future of work. In 2020 Heather was recognized as one of the top 50 female futurists in the world by Forbes. Heather's sessions help employees and leaders alike prepare for and adapt to jobs that do not yet exist.

McGowan has provided keynote addresses for audiences from start-ups to government organizations to universities to publicly traded Fortune 100 companies, including AMP Financial, SAP, Abbvie, Biogen, Fidelity, FIS, Mastercard, AT&T, Financial Times, Siemens, Microsoft, Google, Facebook, Kaiser Permanente, JPMorgan Chase, Lockheed Martin, MassMutual, MetLife, Best Buy, Raytheon, The US Army, Accor Hotels, Paramount, Chevron, AARP, Zendesk, Tableau, Fidelity, de Beers, Professional Beauty Association, and The World Bank among hundreds of others. Heather addresses audiences in person from small summits for C suite executives to large events in the tens of thousands. Her virtual talks have reached hundreds of thousands. Often quoted in the media, notably in the New York Times, McGowan served on the advisory board for Sparks & Honey, a New York–based culture-focused agency looking to the future for brands. McGowan's academic work has included roles at Rhode Island School of Design, and Jefferson University, where she was the strategic architect of the first undergraduate college focused exclusively on innovation.

From 2019-2022 Heather was appointed as a faculty member of the Swinburne University Centre For the New Workforce in Melbourne, Australia. In 2022, McGowan was awarded an honorary doctorate from Pennsylvania College of Art and Design in addition to earning her MBA from Babson College and her BFA in Industrial Design from Rhode Island School of Design. McGowan is the co-editor and author of the book Disrupt Together: How Teams Consistently Innovate and a Forbes contributor. McGowan's first book on the future of work, published in 2020: The Adaptation Advantage: Let Go, Learn Fast, and Thrive in the Future of Work, reached number three in business management books on Amazon and was named one of the best business books of 2021 by Soundview. McGowan's most recent book The Empathy Advantage: Leading the Empowered Workforce published in March 2023 and is a finalist for the Next Big Idea Book Club and identified as a top ten business book to read in 2023 by Business Chief.

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  Heather McGowan Talk Titles

Leadership Focus:

Leadership Focus:
Behaviors
It is harder to run your business than it was yesterday, there is greater uncertainty– especially global economic uncertainty, persistent inflation, exponentially growing technological capabilities, and employee challenges from disengagement to burnout. Given all this, what is a leader to do to drive profitable growth? Focus on encouraging the behaviors.

We have lunged at degrees, past experience, and skills to secure a deployable workforce that could meet the demands of the day. We have sought to drive productivity through extrinsic pressure. The reality is today, we need to focus on hiring for, developing, and reinforcing the behaviors that enable performance. Curiosity, courage, adaptability, empathy, perseverance, and humility to name a few. Skills will come and go, technology will augment our abilities. Our behaviors will drive performance.

Today's leaders must concurrently drive exceptional performance while fortifying organizational resilience. Through sharing insights, research, analogies, and case studies, McGowan's discourse elucidates why focusing on behavior is both the future of work and the pathway to superior performance today.

Leading With Cohesion to Maintain Org...

Leading With Cohesion to Maintain Organizational Health
The success of any organization hinges entirely on the performance of its people and, more specifically, their ability to communicate and collaborate. Our increasing polarization is robbing performance. As social beings, our collaborative nature has propelled us to the top of the food chain. It is now believed Homo Sapiens emerged ahead of other human ancestors not because we were stronger or faster or had larger brains, we did not, but because of our ability to both communicate and collaborate. However, our growing isolation is reshaping our brain function. When individuals feel lonely, their amygdala triggers a "fight or flight" response and activates our sympathetic nervous system, fostering an "us" vs. "them" hostile response. Moreover, a rapid amalgamation of social, cultural, and technological shifts, though inherently apolitical, has been politicized, exacerbated by social media echo chambers that reinforce our biases, reducing our ability to trust and collaborate. In the end civility is lost and with it trust, engagement, performance, growth, and profitability.

To navigate your organization through inevitable change cycles—whether adapting to AI, restructuring, launching new products, or simply sustaining success—it's imperative to keep your team focused and cohesive, through minimizing interruption and internal conflicts. Heather's presentation delves into the origins of our current state of distraction and division, drawing on research to pinpoint key factors contributing to distraction, while offering strategies to foster cohesion and concentration within your organization.

Note: This discussion does not revolve around politics or personal views, but rather explores the biological and cultural factors that have divided us, alongside practical leadership tools for managing an increasingly fractured and distracted workforce with techniques to lead profitable growth and performance through focus on connection, curiosity, shared vision, and purpose.

The Augmented Era:

The Augmented Era:
Maximizing Human Potential
Throughout much of the history of work, talent has traditionally been gauged by physical outputs. Despite the advent of transformative technologies such as generative artificial intelligence, one undeniable truth remains: the defining characteristic of this era is the ability to harness the potential of your workforce to drive profitable growth.

Research consistently highlights the pivotal role of human capital, which contributes a staggering 90% of enterprise value in the S&P 500. While technology, particularly generative artificial intelligence, increasingly handles routine tasks, the real competitive advantage lies in the performance of augmented human talent and creativity.

We've now entered the era of human value, where humans are recognized as assets to cultivate rather than expenses to minimize. No matter how impressive technology may be, its effectiveness is ultimately determined by the humans who utilize it.

In this presentation, explore strategies for navigating and mastering this challenging yet exhilarating new landscape, where we not only learn from technology but also collaborate and innovate alongside it. This paradigm shift encourages us to view technology as a partner in our journey, rather than a mere tool to be wielded.

Building Resilient Teams Without Burn...

Building Resilient Teams Without Burnout
In today's dynamic and rapidly evolving work environment, maintaining peak performance while preventing burnout is paramount. Ignoring societal polarization does little to mitigate distractions. To help our teams stay focused and excel, it's crucial to realign them with shared values, their desired impact on the world, and a sense of belonging to something greater than themselves—offering profound opportunities for growth.

This enlightening discussion explores the art of cultivating resilient teams capable of thriving amidst adversity while prioritizing well-being. Drawing on cutting-edge research and practical approaches, this presentation delves into the transformative potential of authentic leadership, effective communication, empathy as a performance driver, and fostering a highly performance workplace culture. Discover actionable strategies to nurture resilience through emphasizing the importance of trust-building and psychological safety, both crucial for organizational health and sustainable, profitable growth.

The Future Of Work Is Learning and Ad...

The Future Of Work Is Learning and Adaptation
In an age characterized by rapid technological progress within a globally interconnected economy, traditional work functions have undergone fragmentation, automation, and technological enhancement—particularly with the emergence of generative artificial intelligence. This shift necessitates a reassessment of education systems, workforce development strategies, organizational frameworks, talent management approaches, and even individual perspectives. Whereas previously we learned to work, we now must work continually to learn.

While the pursuit of closing a perpetual skills gap has been ongoing, Heather advocates for prioritizing hiring based on behaviors that facilitate heightened performance, irrespective of given skills and talents. McGowan suggests prioritizing candidates who demonstrate an intrinsic connection to purpose, an agile learning mindset adaptable to market fluctuations, and, significantly, behaviors indicative of a continual desire for improvement and growth.

During this presentation, Heather will distill recent research findings and provide actionable insights for organizations seeking to attract, cultivate, and retain talent characterized by a propensity for continuous learning and adaptability.

  Topics

Change Disruption Technology / IT Innovation Strategic Planning Education Future Trends Best-Selling Author Workforce Virtual Presentat... Leadership Diversity, Equity... Empowerment Employee Engageme... Corporate Culture

More topics

  Books

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