Henna Pryor

Advances in technology have made it easy to avoid real – and sometimes difficult – human interaction. While texting, online ordering, and “swiping right” is convenient, we’re losing the skills of relating to others, building trust and connection, and enduring the critical friction and messiness we get from being in proximity to each other. This new reality is weakening our social muscles and slowly destroying our ability to have the conversations needed to connect at the highest level, take smart risks, and navigate today’s increasingly complicated world of work.

Navigating uncertain times sounds obvious enough, but most of us have a hard time moving from wishful thinking to execution. Why? Because when we stumble through those moments, we feel awkward – and that awkwardness bumps up against our deep desire for others to approve of us and what we do. As it turns out, it’s what we improve in the face of these moments – often despite others’ judgment – that leads to the greatest growth.

Join world-renowned keynote speaker, Inc. Magazine columnist, and Workplace Performance Expert, Henna Pryor, to learn how embracing the Good Awkward is your secret weapon for skyrocketing teamwork, speaking up boldly and effectively, and strengthening your adversity muscle.

Good Awkward helps you unlock your highest level of power and influence to navigate the world around you. Audiences will leave feeling more confident, equipped to build stronger teams, and ready to lead to their highest potential, all wrapped in the laughter and relatability her audiences can’t get enough of.

After this keynote, you’ll be able to:

• Pinpoint the exact reason it’s been difficult to take risks and embrace change – and how to move past it
• Use deliberate discomfort and strategic microstressors to rebuild our social and risk-taking muscles
• Create a custom plan for collaborating, speaking up, sharing ideas, and being brave and change-ready whenever the chance arises

In the modern workplace, the psychology for creating new actions, influence, inspiration, and navigating through uncertainty has changed. We need to take a new approach to create new actions in our teammates and in ourselves, to persuade prospects, to have difficult conversations, and to maximize opportunities for partnership.

If you’ve ever found yourself facing resistance to your ideas – you’re not alone. Even when we have a great idea that will affect enormous change, we don’t always get the reaction – or action – we’re hoping for.

That’s because we spend the majority of our energy making our ideas and changes more compelling, more interesting, more attractive — pouring on the fuel — that we rarely discover the frictions that are working against us, and all humans have them.

In this interactive session, join 2x TEDx and Global Keynote Speaker, Author, and Workplace Performance Expert, Henna Pryor, to uncover and explore the 3 specific reasons why people resist change, and more importantly, concrete strategies to overcome them so we can move our ideas, initiatives, team members, prospects, and mission forward.

After this keynote, you’ll be able to:

• Shift away from problem-solving to a more valuable strategy
• Understand how being the “expert” is hurting your influence instead of helping
• Position your idea from several new angles that increase trust and get the green light you need for people to say yes

We’ve never been connected — or more disconnected. Technology has made it effortless to reach anyone, anywhere, anytime… yet, 44% of workers describe their workplace relationships as “superficial,” and 1 in 3 employees would rather scrub a toilet than ask a colleague for help.

So, the real question is: How can we feel as connected socially as we are technologically?

In this high-energy, insightful, and first-of-its-kind keynote based on her pioneering national research study, Workplace Performance Expert Henna Pryor reveals what’s really holding teams back—and it’s not lack of skill, resources, or talent. It’s Social Muscle Atrophy (SMA) — a hidden performance killer that weakens trust, silos collaboration, and slows innovation. The good news? Social Muscle Strength (SMS) isn’t something you’re born with. It’s something you build.

You’ll learn the Social Muscle Framework — an actionable, digestible, and easy-to-implement process that addresses the two key levers that unlock peak team performance: Design and Dimension.

She’ll share how today’s top leaders are rethinking relationship-building, reengineering communication, and creating conditions where collaboration and innovation happen naturally, so teams can perform even better with the resources they already have.

By the end of this keynote, you’ll be able to:

• Recognize the early warning signs of Social Muscle Atrophy — and stop them before they derail your team
• Implement the Social Muscle Framework to create smarter, faster, and stronger collaboration, communication, and innovation
• Design systems that encourage trust, idea-sharing, and problem-solving in today’s modern world

If you’re ready to future-proof your team’s ability to perform at the highest level — this is the keynote that will change the way you think about team success forever.

With the changing world of work, tough competition, and information overload, pushing for growth and inspiring teams feels harder than ever. We may have achieved high levels of excellence, but that excellence comes at a surprising cost – it keeps us stagnant and quietly discourages taking the risks and tackling the problems we need to tackle to grow today. Why?

The dark side of success is we often focus on what we already excel at instead of leaning into the discomfort of what excelling today requires: heightened adversity tolerance, escaping silos, and thinking outside of the box. Luckily for us – we already know the fastest path to major improvement comes from strengthening what’s weak, rather than what’s strong. Today, with change around every corner, that means to learn new ways to become excellent at embracing the discomfort of disruption.

In this keynote, 2x TEDx and Keynote Speaker, Inc. Columnist and Author, and Workplace Performance Expert, Henna Pryor will share the modern strategies and skills for skyrocketing your team’s performance, frontloading the new mindsets needed to embrace disruption, and unlocking the innovation needed to tap into new sources of success.

After this keynote, you’ll be able to:

• Pinpoint the exact reason it’s been difficult to take risks and embrace change – and how to move past them
• Use tools like ostentatious objectivity and deliberate discomfort to expand mental muscle
• Formulate a personalized game plan to be change-ready whenever the chance arises
• Not only will you feel more empowered to stretch into new spaces personally, but you’ll walk away with specific mindset tactics and strategies for your teams to be more resilient, less stressed, and more empowered by disruption in your own lives.