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The Lavin Agency Speakers Bureau

A speakers bureau that represents the best original thinkers,
writers, and doers for speaking engagements.

Bree Groff

Work can be fun. Seriously!

Author, Today Was Fun: A Book About Work (Seriously) | Workplace Culture Expert | Senior Advisor, SYPartners

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How to be a Change Agent (44:50)

Lavin Exclusive Speaker

For too many of us, workdays are a slog: something we endure just to make it to the weekend. But it doesn’t have to be this way. “Most work, most days, should be fun!” says Bree Groff. “It’s fun to create value, to build and flex our skills, to create alongside others, to leave the world better than we found it.” Bree is a workplace culture expert who has spent her career guiding executives at companies like Microsoft, Google, and Pfizer, as well as the author of Today Was Fun: A Book About Work (Seriously), which Oliver Burkeman (Four Thousand Weeks) calls “exuberant, practical, inspiring, and necessary.” She argues that finding the fun in our work is good for business—and for us. In delightful, energizing, vastly practical keynotes, she offers 5 rules that the highest-performing and happiest teams operate by, showing audiences that great Mondays are, indeed, possible. “After all,” she says, “in order to like the way we’re spending our lives, we need to like the way we’re spending our weekdays.”

“Bree Groff offers a powerful argument: work doesn’t have to be grim, nor does it have to be the source of fulfillment for all of your deepest yearnings; it can, instead, simply be fun. I’m convinced!”—Cal Newport (New York Times bestselling author of Deep Work)

Bree Groff is a workplace culture expert and author of Today Was Fun: A Book About Work (Seriously). She has spent her career guiding executives at companies such as Microsoft, Google, Pfizer, Calvin Klein, Hilton, Stripe, and Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center through periods of complex change. She has interviewed hundreds of employees on their experience of work, led dozens of consulting teams, and learned how to create teams where people have great days doing incredible work.

Her book, Today Was Fun: A Book About Work (Seriously), offers a vital, vibrant new perspective on how we spend our weekdays. With her signature energy and dynamism, Bree brings together personal anecdotes, research, humor, and practical wisdom to outline a compelling vision of modern workplaces that make people feel human and alive. Oliver Burkeman, the New York Times bestselling author of Four Thousand Weeks, says, “I loved this exuberant, practical, inspiring, and necessary book. In her often hilarious style, Bree Groff makes a serious argument: that work should and can be a genuinely fun component of a vibrant, fulfilling, connected, and deeply human life.”

Bree is a Senior Advisor to the global consultancy SYPartners and previously served as the CEO of NOBL Collective. She has founded and led an innovation department at Flint Hill School, advised leaders as a service designer, researched body language while working in the R&D department of a dating app company, and taught high school math and physics. She holds a B.A. from the University of Pennsylvania and an M.S. in Organizational Learning and Change from Northwestern University. She lives in New York City with her husband and daughter.

Testimonials

Bree is a modern-day renaissance woman, a real pioneer for businesses, for people and society. At several of our events around the world, Bree was the most praised and inspiring speaker. Her speeches bring about immediate action. If there is one individual on this planet you need in your business now, it is Bree.

Plexal

Testimonials

Bree was a delight to work with. She lifted the day with her bright, humorous and human approach. The audience loved her, and even those on our AV team—who watch speakers day in and day out—commented that her delivery was one of the best they’d ever seen!

Mirum

Testimonials

I heard Bree addressing a media & creative business audience in London and was immediately bowled over! She spoke about defining and meeting your own “North Star.” Rather than discuss the destination or end-goal, Bree spoke about the journey and how to tackle the ups, downs and changes of direction on any business or personal journey you take. Her openness, honesty, and understanding of the challenges and ambiguities along the way were truly refreshing.

Maxus, WPP

Testimonials

Bree has a gift of getting to the core of human emotions that drive change and inspiring teams to create a culture of inclusivity, transparency and innovation.

Calvin Klein

Testimonials

You were incredible on stage! So dynamic, warm, funny, energetic, passionate, clear—you were a total joy to watch!

Charter

Testimonials

Bree has an outstanding delivery on stage—she is able to convince even the most skeptical executive about the value of having a fluid culture within their organization!

Intercorp

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Clint Smith

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Speech Topics

Corporate Culture

Today Was FunDoing Your Best Work (and Having Fun in the Process)

We don’t need to continue working as we have been, says Bree Groff. We don’t need to make “good enough” work because we’re too busy actually think. We don’t need to dress up in business masks, pretending and slogging and dreading the thing that should fulfill us. There’s a better way forward.

“At a moment when burnout is rampant and globally only 21% of employees are engaged, we need to be asking what’s at stake for our businesses, yes,” Bree says. “But further, we need to be asking what’s at stake for our lives.”

In this interactive keynote filled with client examples, research, and tools, Bree shares 5 rules for better days at work, including:

Most work, most days, should be fun.
Make brilliant work. Don’t let busyness and normalness sabotage you.
Get good at life, not just work.

Audiences walk away feeling lighter, more human, more hopeful, and with practices you can use immediately to excavate and amplify the fun of work—for yourself and your team.

After all, in order to like the way we’re spending our lives, we need to like the way we’re spending our weekdays.