Dr. Margie Warrell ignites action, closing the gap between knowing what’s needed and having the courage to do it.
Drawing on decades of experience emboldening people and organisations worldwide, Margie brings a rare ability to bridge intellect and emotion—connecting strategy with psychology to equip leaders to navigate today's complexity with greater clarity, conviction and courage.
A dynamic keynote speaker with authentic Australian warmth, Margie has delivered high-impact presentations for organisations ranging from NASA to Google to US Special Operations. Her message resonates whether she's advising Fortune 500 executives or business owners: courage is the ultimate differentiator—essential for taking smart risks, bridging divides, accelerating adaptation, and shaping a stronger future.
As a former Senior Partner in C-Suite Advisory at Korn Ferry, Margie brings executive-level depth to her speaking, having guided boards and C-suite leaders through critical challenges in leadership, team performance, succession, and cultural transformation. Her research-backed insights provide practical tools to overcome hidden derailers to ensure stronger decision making, accelerated innovation and critical conversations.
Margie’s journey from rural Australian dairy farm to global thought leader brings rare credibility to her work. Having lived and worked across four continents—Australia, Asia, Europe, and North America—she offers a globally grounded perspective on the universal challenges we all face. This rich international experience enables her to cut through complexity, cut straight to the heart of what both limits and unlocks human potential across industry sectors, cultures and geographies. Her authentic style enables her to connect deeply with audiences at all levels, blending data-driven insights with memorable storytelling that leads to lasting behavioural shifts that move the needle.
Based in Old Town Alexandria, Virginia, Margie embodies the courage she champions in others—from climbing Kilimanjaro with her four children to crossing the Sahara to, most recently, running her first (New York) marathon. For an unforgettable keynote that emboldens people to take the bold action these times demand, Margie delivers.
Talking Points
LEAD BRAVELY: Close the courage gap to amplify impact – from the inside out
In times of relentless change and rising complexity, hesitation is costly. It’s not enough for leaders to know what to do—they must become the kind of leaders who can do it. That requires more than strategy. It’s one thing to read Brené Brown; it’s another to lead like her in real life. Courage is crucial. Today’s most effective leaders are grounded in purpose, anchored in self-awareness, and equipped to navigate ambiguity while cultivating collective courage across teams and culture.LEAD BRAVELY: Close the courage gap to amplify impact – from the inside out
In this high-impact keynote, Dr Margie Warrell delivers a bold recalibration of what’s possible when courage is elevated and insecurity is let go. Margie unpacks the real work of leadership—where comfort zones end and growth begins—bridging the gap between inner evolution and outer results. With compelling stories and evidence-based insights, she guides leaders to dismantle the psychological barriers—fear of judgement, risk-aversion, imposter beliefs—that quietly sabotage exceptional performance and suppress candour. This keynote equips leaders to stop operating from insecurity and start leading from conviction—resetting their trajectory for next-level growth and sustained impact.
Key Audience Takeaways:
- The Case for Courage: Understand how fear-based leadership exacts a “timidity tax” and long-term vulnerability—and how scaling courage unlocks stronger performance and sustained advantage.
- Lead from Values, Not Emotions: Learn how inner alignment drives outer effectiveness, shifting from insecurity alleviation to purpose-powered action.
- From Groupthink to Generative Thinking: Foster “loyal dissent” and bold thinking that breaks from convention to fuel innovation and resilience.
- Galvanise Shared Purpose: Craft and communicate a compelling “why” to ignite accountability, collaboration, and creative problem-solving.
- Scale a Culture of Courage: Apply four principles that build psychologically safe teams, reduce perceived risk, and create the conditions for bold, aligned action at scale.
Why Margie?
While many leadership Speakers focus on change, innovation or growth, Dr Margie Warrell goes deeper—unpacking the human fears and mindset patterns that quietly undermine all three. Drawing on decades of global experience—including as Senior Partner in C-Suite Advisory at Korn Ferry—she equips leaders to embed courage into how they show up, communicate, build trust and lead change.
Whether working with Fortune 500 executives, YPO forums or Special Operations teams, Margie provides insights that shift mindsets and turn bold ideas into bolder results. This keynote delivers more than inspiration—it’s a reset. A proven path for turning insight into action, real-life, and potential into results.
Ideal For:
Executives, teams, senior and mid-level leaders, high-potential programmes, and innovation-driven organisations navigating growth, disruption or transformation. Can be adapted to interactive workshops or multi-day events.
TAKE THE CHANCE: How to take the chances that change everything
We often know what to do yet we don’t do what we know. Fear is a silent killer of potential, widening the gap between thought and action – stifling initiative, fuelling indecision, limiting growth and leaving potential to lay dormant. Everyone misses out.TAKE THE CHANCE: How to take the chances that change everything
At a time when 85% of people cite fear of failure as their #1 barrier to action and 70% of employees are afraid to speak up at work, Margie draws on insights from her latest book You’ve Got This! to help your audience reclaim their agency, reimagine their future and step bravely into the gap between where they are and where they want to be. Your audience will leave with real-world strategies to turn their fear into fuel — igniting passion toward a bolder vision and ready to take the chances needed to make it reality. After all, it’s the chances we don’t take that ultimately cost us the most.
Key Audience Takeaways:
- Flip Your Fear: How to turn fear into an ally, and calibrate awkward moments and discomfort as a signpost for growth and cue to speak up and step forward.
- Take Smart Risks: Recognise the unconscious biases that drive over-caution and learn a simple tool to discern smart risks from reckless ones.
- Fail Forward: Recalibrate the relationship with failure to “mine the gold,” applying those lessons to reset more quickly and step forward wiser, braver, and better off.
- Reset and Rescript: Clarify your highest intention to focus on what you want—not what you fear—and rewrite the story that’s been keeping you stressed, stuck and too safe.
- Speak Bravely: Step into the conversations that count—one minute, one moment, one message at a time. Risk the discomfort.
Why Margie?
Dr Margie Warrell has learned a lot about managing fear, defying doubt and taking chances since her childhood on the Aussie bush. Weaving humorous and heartfelt storytelling, she connects with academic research to adopt a ‘courage mindset’ in very practical and deeply human ways.
Margie’s Courage Quiz can be integrated live to give audiences an immediate, personal window into their own courage gaps—making this keynote as interactive as it is inspiring.
Ideal For:
Company-wide events, personal and professional development conferences, all-employee or high-potential gatherings seeking to fuel bold thinking and personal agency. Can be adapted into more interactive programs, 2-hour to full day.
BRAVE THE AWKWARD: The heart of human connection in an overwired world
In today’s hyper-connected workplace—where curated profiles, Slack replies, and AI-generated messages dominate—something vital is getting lost: our capacity for real human connection. As it becomes easier to opt out and harder to have honest conversations, we’re seeing a growing gap between surface-level communication and true belonging. The very technologies designed to bring us closer are eroding the awkward but essential interpersonal skills that build trust, foster belonging, and fuel collaboration. We’ve become masters of impression management but novices at genuine vulnerability.BRAVE THE AWKWARD: The heart of human connection in an overwired world
In this timely keynote, Dr Margie Warrell cuts through the digital noise to reveal what it truly takes to “brave the awkward” and forge the authentic connections our hearts and workplaces desperately need. From sharing bold ideas that challenge the status quo to asking for help when we’re struggling, these vulnerable moments—however uncomfortable—are precisely where relationships get tested, cultures transform, and breakthroughs happen. Drawing on cutting-edge research and real-world case studies, Dr Warrell provides practical tools to navigate the courage gap between staying safe in superficial interactions and stepping into the transformative power of genuine human connection.
With belonging and engagement at historic lows, organisations need leaders who can create genuine connection across digital divides. This keynote provides the roadmap for building cultures where people feel safe to be human, take risks, and bring their full selves to work—the foundation of both employee wellbeing and business success.
Key Audience Takeaways:
- The 3C Model – Clarity, Courage, Connection: A simple model to speak truth with love, navigate sensitive conversations and avoid the costly “timidity tax” of avoidance.
- From Impression Management to Shared Humanity: Tools to move beyond status anxiety and performative behaviours toward mutual vulnerability and authentic connection.
- Braving Silence: How to sit in the discomfort of silence or create space for the conversations that matter most—beneath the surface.
- Disarming Defensiveness: How to amplify authenticity to show up in ways that make others feel safe to lower their guard, trust your intention and connect at the next level.
- Digital Courage in Virtual Environments: Strategies to use tech to connect—not hide—and bridge the emotional distance of remote and hybrid work.
Why Margie?
Margie’s guiding belief: what comes from the heart, lands on the heart—and courage is the key to building workplaces (and lives) where people can show up fully, connect deeply, and act with authenticity. A global citizen who has learned how to connect at heart level across diverse cultures around the world, Margie brings a rare combination of academic depth and lived psychological insight to the stage—with warmth, wit, and wisdom.
Ideal For:
Organisations navigating cultural transformation, leadership conferences, corporate retreats, team development summits, and all events focused on strengthening workplace cultures, communication, or enhancing team performance.
DARE TO GROW: How to grow through what you go through
To thrive amid the complexity and pressures of life today requires a new way of relating to life—not to control it or to avoid its challenges—but to expand and deepen our capacity to handle them better. In this uplifting keynote, Margie shares personal stories of heartache and hardship, setbacks and struggles, that will not only provide a blueprint for ‘growing through what we go through’ but will guide your audience with the mindset, tool-set and heart-set to navigate change better, emerge from it stronger, and transform their biggest challenges into the source of their highest growth.DARE TO GROW: How to grow through what you go through
Mixing a powerful blend of theory, practical tools, and heart-expanding wisdom, your audience will walk away not only able to face change and adversity better, but equipped to grow into the best version of themselves because of it.
Key Audience Takeaways
- Resilience Micro-Habits: Integrate simple, sustainable daily rituals to sustain energy, boost recovery, build self-fullness, and ward off burnout.
- Rescript Narratives: Tap the power of language to reframe derailed plans into ‘plot twists’ that turn self-doubt into self-belief and reinforce the personal agency to press on when life presses in.
- Practice ‘Be Before Do’: Why anchoring in the values that define ‘who you want to be’ enables you to operate with self-certainty to bring your bravest self to your biggest challenges
- Breathe In Courage: How to reset your anxiety at the ground level, moving from flight/fight mode to think more creatively and respond more calmly - particularly useful for pressure points.
- Activate Post-Traumatic Growth: Understand how to find purpose in painful situations, find ‘daily victories’ and discover the transformative power of living ‘from cause, not effect.’
Why Margie?
Dr Margie Warrell doesn’t just teach resilience—she’s lived it. From surviving an armed robbery and rebuilding after personal tragedy to raising four children across multiple global moves while pursuing her vocation to empower others to live deeper lives in a superficial world, Margie’s story is one of walking the path of faith over fear, pairing grace and grit, humility and hope. Her ability to bridge head and heart with humility and hard-won wisdom sets her apart.
Ideal For:
Broad audiences, employee wellbeing initiatives, change-management rollouts, organisations navigating change or cultural transformation. Can also be adapted for faith groups or longer form interactive program.
BRAVE WOMEN RISING: Start before you feel ready and make a bet… on yourself
Of the many reasons women remain underrepresented at most decision-making tables, none are due to a lack of talent, ability, or work ethic. In this deeply affirming keynote, Dr Margie Warrell shares her personal journey—from battling self-doubt as a girl in the Aussie bush to defying the invisible barriers and biases that still subtly shape women’s careers, all while raising four children and building a global business.BRAVE WOMEN RISING: Start before you feel ready and make a bet… on yourself
Margie offers a bold invitation to women who want to do more and be more but too often doubt if they can. She unpacks the subtle but powerful pressures women face to be agreeable, humble, and “likeable”—and how women can (and must) make the ultimate and most important bet… on themselves. To be clear, this keynote isn’t about “fixing” women—it’s about equipping them to stop selling themselves short, to rise stronger, and to lead with the confidence they admire in others… even when they don’t feel 100% ready.
Key Audience Takeaways
- Bet on Yourself: Learn how to challenge social expectations, limiting norms, biases and double binds, and own your value without apology and not hide behind humility
- Turn Impostorhood into Growth: Reframe self-doubt as a sign of growth and lean into stretch moments.
- Speak with Authority, Authenticity, and Impact: Communicate with conviction and reset your relationship with power to take care while taking charge.
- Act Before You Feel Ready: Understand why courage precedes confidence—and how bold action builds belief and why you need to risk ‘winging it’ more often
- Rise Together, Not Alone: Build allyship, uplift other women, and foster cultures that multiply courage and impact.
Why Margie?
Margie’s expertise in women’s leadership draws on her doctoral research, global experience, and personal journey as a mother of four and big sister to seven. For over 20 years, she’s empowered women to grow their influence—leading Live Brave retreats worldwide and co-leading a Korn Ferry initiative to advance women to the C-suite. A Women’s Economic Forum honoree and board member of the Women’s Democracy Network, Margie brings practical wisdom to embolden women of all ages, on every path.
Ideal For:
Organisations wanting to grow women’s empowerment conferences, female student leadership events, ERG’s and initiatives to support women and girls. For longer-term development programs, Margie’s insights and tools can be woven into mentoring and professional development curriculums.
Video
Dr. Margie Warrell | Courageous Leadership Keynote Speaker Igniting Braver Action
Dr Margie Warrell is an international speaker who emboldens braver leadership for better outcomes. If you’re looking for a dynamic keynote speaker to ignite bolder action, foster more authentic connection and stronger cultures, Margie is the perfect choice.A Trapeze Lesson: Fear creates the gap between thought and action. Courage closes it.
Dr. Margie Warrell shares in a keynote speech at Google HQ how to close the know/do gap between thought and action. Margie’s book, The Courage Gap, provides a roadmap to close the gap between what we’re capable of doing and the reality we createHow to be brave | Dr Margie Warrell | TEDxButler
Courage and comfort can't ride the same horse. Do you ever wish you were braver? If I just had the guts. Margie shows you how to find all the courage you need. A global authority on courage who has walked her ‘live brave’ talk since growing up the big sister of seven on a dairy farm in rural Australia. The first in her family to attend college, Margie has lived in multiple countries and recently returned to the US. Margie pairs a global perspective with her diverse background in psychology, coaching and Fortune 500 business to unlock the potential that fear holds captive – in individuals and organizations alike. Trusted by Salesforce, NASA, Dell, Morgan Stanley and United Nations Foundation to deliver transformative programs that foster courage, creativity and collaboration, her 5 bestselling books reflect her passion for helping people overcome timidity, step into their brilliance and lead more purposeful lives with greater impact. Margie loves adventure travel and hiking in beautiful places, most recently climbing Mt Kilimanjaro with her husband and their four children.Margie Warrell | Introduction | Saxton Speakers Bureau
Margie Warrell is an expert in overcoming personal adversity and a passionate advocate for gender equality and inclusive leadership. Margie draws on her background in Fortune 500 business and the latest research to equip people with the mindset, strategies and skills essential to lead themselves and others to better outcomes.Margie Warrell | Power has No Gender | Saxton Speakers Bureau
For women who want to do more & be more but too often doubt they can Despite the compelling case to have more women seated at decision-making tables, too few still are. The reasons for the 'leaky pipeline' are many and the solutions complex, yet one thing is certain: empowering women to challenge gender norms and step into their power as change makers is not just the right thing to do, it's commercially smart.Margie Warrell | Embracing Change | Saxton Speakers Bureau
Over 40% of what university students are learning today will be obsolete ten years from now. In a rapidly changing workplace, embracing change is increasingly vital to being successful. Margie discusses importance of being proactive in the face of change and embracing discomfort in order to make the most of it.Margie Warrell | Building a Culture of Courage | Saxton Speakers Bureau
The greatest threat to organisation is not coming from the outside, its coming from within. Fear as an emotion is contagious and fear of change is dangerous. Margie discusses the steps that leaders can take to create a culture of courage within their workplaceMargie Warrell | Brave Leadership | Saxton Speakers Bureau
How exceptional leaders harness the potential in themselves and others Empower your leaders with a deeper sense of purpose, passion, courage and confidence. Drawing on the latest research in leadership and neuroscience, plus interviews with some of the world's most respected change makers, Margie will get to the heart of what undermines leadership effectiveness, sharing science-based strategies to embrace disconfort, rethinl risk and lead from possibility.If you are looking for a powerful yet practical message to inspire our team to take action, Margie is the speaker for you! The audience feels the positive and personal message she delivers w ... keep reading National Instruments
Margie is a true expert in her field who immediately captivates an audience.
Margie facilitated an outstanding program with my Asia Pacific leadership team. She connected immediately and had everyone fully engaged and participating. Even the skeptics in my team were very impressed with her approach and style and we all left inspired to execute action plans to improve their leadership effectiveness. I recommend Margie to any company seeking to up the ante on their leadership capability.
Margie's insights and ability to deliver thought-provoking and empowering sessions for leaders of all levels from diverse backgrounds is impressive. I've since engaged Margie for many leadership events, always with incredible feedback.
Margie's keynote on creating a culture of courage was dynamic, passionate and thought provoking. The feedback from our top 100 leaders was overwhelmingly positive. We will all go forward a little bolder and braver than before!
Margie is a truly sensational speaker. She had our audience hanging off her every word - her thought provoking, engaging and professional presentation style along with her unique ability to be down to earth was truely refreshing and motivating. I would recommend Margie as a keynote speaker anytime.
I've been meaning to write to thank you very much for your wonderful presentation. The room were highly engaged and the content was relevant to both genders. I know we will be reaping the positive rewards from this event and your words of wisdom for a long time!! I often hear around the office, when someone is delaying doing something, now come on, be courageous Thank you very much for delivering perfectly what we discussed and giving the team the courage and push they needed to be brave.
Margie sets herself apart with a powerful and inspiring message, paired with her energetic, down-to-earth, and disarming delivery. Inviting her to speak here at the United Nations Foundation helped me bolster my personal vision for a candid, collaborative, and forward-leaning workplace. Margie reminds us about the hidden costs of inaction while offering a refreshing and realistic perspective on how we can challenge ourselves and others to be more courageous, take more risks, and find more success. Feedback from her program was overwhelmingly positive and enthusiastic. We would welcome her back any time!
