John Austin, PhD

Building foresight skills, embracing uncertainty, leading change.

Add To My Favorites Check Fee/Availability

In-Person Fee Range:

$7,501 - $10,000

Traveling from:

Maine

John Austin, PhD – Strategic Thinking: Limiting Mindsets

VIEW ALL 3 Videos

Topics

Leadership Speakers Change Speakers Business Transformation/Change Management Future Business Speakers Human Resources Speakers Strategic Planning Management Speakers Leadership and Inspiration Disruption Team Building Speakers

John Austin, PhD

Building foresight skills, embracing uncertainty, leading change.

Add To My Favorites Check Fee/Availability

In-Person Fee Range:

$7,501 - $10,000

Fee Details

Traveling from:

Maine

Why Book

Dr. Austin helps leaders and teams ‘see around the corner’. He inspires audience members to thrive in moments of high uncertainty and helps organizations set a path towards their preferred futures.
Create an aspirational mindset by placing all participants in a future custom designed for your organization. Which companies are thriving in these futures? How have customer needs changed? How is value created? These future-focused insights will find their way into conversations throughout the rest of your event.
Help your audience transform their understanding of uncertainty and learn actions enabling them to thrive. Dr. Austin will share small moves and mindset shifts that allow us to transform discomfort with uncertainty into positive momentum and inspired action.

Biography

John Austin brings together a unique mix of experiences to create high-energy, mindset-shifting talks. He brings his experience as a global strategist, teacher and leadership coach, stage actor, entrepreneur, and award-winning researcher to everything he does.

Dr. Austin is a Partner in Dynamic Foresight Group as well as the P.D. Merrill Endowed Chair and Inaugural Dean for the University of New England Honors College. He teaches in executive programs at Duke CE, The Wharton School, Georgetown University, and Penn State University. He has been on the faculty at Penn State University and The University of Washington. Dr. Austin also worked as a Principal at the noted strategy and scenario planning consultancy, Decision Strategies International (DSI). He has worked with numerous global Fortune 500 companies, government agencies and professional associations developing leaders and leading long-term projects in the areas of strategic foresight, leading through uncertainty, change management, team performance, and strategy execution.

Dr. Austin holds a BA in economics from The Johns Hopkins University and a PhD in organization studies from Boston College. He’s conducted research on team leadership, organizational change implementation, and strategic decision-making. His research on knowledge-based decision-making teams is widely cited in the academic literature, as is his work on the strategic actions of internal change agents.

Dr. Austin’s research has been published in leading management and applied psychology journals including the International Journal of Project Management, Journal of Applied Psychology, and Organization Science, as well as practice-oriented publications such as HR Magazine, Fast Company, and The OD Practitioner. His work has been recognized with three Best Paper awards from the Academy of Management. He is the author of Unquestioned Brilliance: Navigating a Fundamental Leadership Trap and Leading Effective Change: A Primer for the HR Professional published as part of the SHRM Foundation’s Effective Practice Guidelines Series.

When John is not working you will find him hiking, kayaking, walking his dog and enjoying his time as part of an island community on the coast of Maine.

Programs

From Coping to Thriving: Capitalizing on the Disruptions Others Fear

This engaging and interactive talk challenges the conventional wisdom that stability and control are prerequisites for success. Dr. Austin explores how external uncertainty creates unique strategic openings that the prepared mind can exploit. Learn why those who master the psychology of uncertainty develop a decisive competitive edge when everyone else is paralyzed by the unexpected.

Key Takeaways:

The “Opportunity Gap”: why moments of maximum external uncertainty create the greatest competitive openings
How to develop “uncertainty intelligence”—the ability to spot hidden patterns and opportunities in chaotic environments before others
The four mental shifts that transform external disruption from a threat to your greatest strategic asset
Why conventional risk management actually blinds organizations to breakthrough opportunities during turbulent times
The “Strategic Opportunism Framework”: a systematic approach to rapidly capitalize on unexpected market shifts while competitors are still processing the change

Embracing Uncertainty: Strategic Foresight Skills for a Rapidly Changing World

With the increasing speed of change, uncertainty, and complexity in today’s world, the ability to anticipate external shifts in the environment is more important than ever. This keynote/workshop will help participants improve their strategic foresight skills by offering tools for tracking trends, creating deep understandings of possible industry futures, and stress testing current initiatives against shifting contexts. It will include practical action items for seeing environmental shifts before others and setting proactive, rather than reactive, strategies. Participants will leave the workshop with a deep understanding of the long-term possibilities of their industry and techniques they can use with their own teams to strengthen foresight and strategic thinking skills.

In the session participants will learn:

Ways our current strategic sense making often blinds us to future shifts and develop strategies to reduce these blind spots.
Ways to separate high impact trend shifts from noise and short-term perturbations.
Facilitation techniques for helping teams shift from trying to predict futures to anticipating and monitoring realistic but qualitatively new industry futures.
Tools for stress-testing short-term actions against future uncertainties to create more resilient and robust initiatives.

Future-Proof Leadership: How Edge Futures Drive Strategic Innovation

Explore how the innovative concept of “edge futures” helps organizations break free from traditional planning constraints. Through compelling case studies, discover how exploring seemingly unlikely futures can reveal powerful strategic opportunities. Learn how one organization’s journey from 16 potential futures to 8 actionable scenarios created tangible strategic advantages in technology adoption, stakeholder engagement, and market positioning. See how systematically exploring the edges of possibility can transform uncertainty into opportunity. Perfect for leaders seeking fresh approaches to strategic planning in an era of rapid change.

Unique Option: Dr. Austin will prepare customized edge futures exclusively for your audience.

The audience will leave with:

A practical framework for generating and evaluating edge futures that push beyond conventional scenario planning, including templates and methodologies they can implement immediately with their teams
A systematic approach to identifying strategic actions that create value across multiple future scenarios, enabling more resilient and innovative planning processes

The Backcasting Visioning Process: Working Backward to Move Forward

Traditional strategic planning starts with today and projects forward—but what if we turned that model upside down? Through real-world examples across multiple industries, discover how backcasting transforms abstract future scenarios into concrete action plans. Learn the four-phase implementation process that helps organizations, teams, and individuals bridge the gap between long-term vision and immediate action. Featuring practical tools for team alignment, resource allocation, and building organizational capabilities that can be implemented immediately. Essential insights for CEOs, board members, and strategic planning teams looking to turn future vision into present action.

Unique element of this program: Dr. Austin starts this program by immersing every audience member in a future of their industry. These futures are customized for each audience and immediately stimulate fun audience engagement using a strategically important and relevant issue for participants.

The audience will leave with:

A structured methodology for working backward from desired future states to create actionable implementation roadmaps
Tools for aligning stakeholders around long-term vision while maintaining focus on near-term actions

Topics

Leadership Speakers, Change Speakers, Business Transformation/Change Management, Future, Business Speakers, Human Resources Speakers, Strategic Planning, Management Speakers, Leadership and Inspiration, Disruption, Team Building Speakers,

John Austin, PhD Reviews

“Using illustrations and examples, Dr. Austin was able to engage our group of executives and explain the benefits and process of strategic mapping. Strategic mapping has the potential to be useful for decision making in capital projects, in tracking the sales cycle, and implementing new accounts. Very informative learning session!”

— Jarrett Companies

John is that rare partner who brings deep knowledge, extensive experience, and powerhouse credentials, all wrapped up in a persona that is personable, positive and present. When John commits to a project you know he will be reliably prepared, and yet able to adapt at a moment’s notice if needed. My organization works with a multitude of experts in corporate strategy, change management and leadership development, giving them a front row seat to our customers and their concerns – which is an honor and a challenge. Consistently we receive feedback from our session participants that John is “fantastic”, “engaging”, “thoughtful” and “easy to talk with”.

— Senior Expert Network Manager, Udemy Business

“I write with high praise of Dr. John Austin as a dynamic leader and facilitator of leadership training and consulting. I have known Dr. Austin for over 15 years. In recent years, I have asked John to be a member of a five-person team to provide virtual training on “Strategic Communication for Leaders” through the Smeal College of Business at The Pennsylvania State University. John strikes a fantastic balance of authority and approachability. He is one of the best at finding the right equilibrium among instruction, activities, and facilitated discussion. Professor Austin’s ratings, as provided by the participants at the conclusion of the three days of training, are consistently the highest of all the members of the five-person team.”

— Associate Professor of Leadership Communication, Penn State University

“Having had the privilege of working with Dr. Austin as an expert facilitator, I wholeheartedly recommend him. Dr. Austin is not just an author and speaker; he is a high-energy force that challenges audiences to perceive opportunities in uncertainty. His ability to customize strategic foresight for any audience sets him apart. Dr. Austin’s expertise in Change Leadership at the Executive Level is evident in his engaging presentations that inspire and motivate leaders to embrace change as a catalyst for growth. His strategic planning skills are second to none, offering a roadmap for organizations to not only adapt but thrive in dynamic environments. Dr. Austin is a dynamic and knowledgeable facilitator with a unique ability to communicate complex concepts in an accessible manner. I highly recommend him for anyone seeking a speaker, author, or facilitator with a deep understanding of Future Business Trends, Change Leadership, Strategic Planning, and Decision Making at the executive level.”

— Vice President of Professional Services, Momentus Technologies

“Dr. John Austin is a polished, dynamic and highly-rated speaker for the Institute for Management Studies whose program “Critical Thinking” offered eye-opening and practical insights into the dynamics of decision-making for issues that involve significant uncertainty. As a result of attending his program, our attendees were able to practice and apply the skills and strategies they learned to the complex problems they face to help them make the best decisions possible.”

— Chair, IMS Columbus, Institute for Management Studies