The Lavin Agency Speakers Bureau
A speakers bureau that represents the best original thinkers,
writers, and doers for speaking engagements.
A speakers bureau that represents the best original thinkers,
writers, and doers for speaking engagements.
Are you looking for an edge to help you succeed? Good news: You've already got one.
How do you get a competitive “edge” at work and in life? Star business professor Laura Huang says that we don’t need to change ourselves to get the upper hand: we can simply make the most of who we already are and what we already know. She’s a Distinguished Professor at Northeastern and the Director of the Women’s Entrepreneurship Center, as well as a Harvard professor and the author of Edge and the forthcoming You Already Know. Laura teaches us how to use everything—even our perceived flaws and the systemic biases that hold us back—to our advantage. And she shows us how to hone our intuition (that unique blend of external data and personal experience) to make the right decisions and turn obstacles into assets.
“We’re all looking for an edge. But where does it come from? Laura Huang provides the answers. Be authentic and distinct. Provide value to others. And turn adversity into advantage.”—Daniel H. Pink, author of To Sell Is Human
How do we find the elusive “edge” that will help us gain success? We don’t need to go searching too far, says Laura Huang, acclaimed business professor and author of Edge: Turning Adversity into Advantage. If we learn more about our strengths and weaknesses and put them both to work with grit and determination, we can empower ourselves to create personal success—and find our edge. Laura’s talks teach us how to use that edge in a strategic way, drawing on examples from Olympians to Louis Vuitton assistants-turned-executives; along the way, she’ll show you that staying sharp means understanding and building on everything about yourself, even the flaws that you thought would be an obstacle.
Laura’s groundbreaking research also includes her work on “gut feel”—that underrated sixth sense that helps us make better decisions (even when we don’t realize it). She’s conducted dozens of interviews with investors and entrepreneurs, revealing the vital role that gut feel plays in managing complexity and risk—and the difference between big wins and playing it safe. And in her most recent book, You Already Know: The Science of Mastering Your Intuition, she offers a new scientific way to hone and harness your intuition in order to make better decisions at work and in life.
Laura shows us how to “take control of our toughest challenges with poise and authenticity” (New York Times bestselling author Seth Stephens-Davidowitz), giving all of us a model for what it means to use our natural talents to the fullest. She’s a Distinguished Professor at Northeastern and the Director of the Women’s Entrepreneurship Center, where she studies relationships and bias in entrepreneurship and at the workplace. She is also a professor at Harvard and has previously held a faculty position at Wharton. She was named one of the 40 Best Business School Professors Under the Age of 40 by Poets and Quants, and was named to the global Thinkers50 Radar list as one of the top thinkers with the potential to change the world of theory and practice. Laura has been featured in The Wall Street Journal, Forbes, USA Today, and Financial Times.
Laura was amazing, I wish we had allotted more time to her. We surveyed the participants, and she scored the highest based on the top speaker. I know she only scratched the surface on her work so I am already thinking about ways we can perhaps leverage her for next year (if she is available) as a part #2. Personally, I have her book and saw her speak a couple years ago and it was such an honor to meet her and get to know her a little bit. She was so approachable and really fit in so well.
Royal Bank of CanadaHarvard Business School Behavioral Science Professor "40 Under 40 MBA Professor" Author of TALK: The Science of Conversation and the Art of Being Ourselves
Speaker on Stress and Leadership in the Workplace Columbia Business School Professor Host of The TED Business Podcast
Associate Professor of Business Economics and Public Policy at Wharton 2024 "Top 40 Under 40" Business Professor Author, Having It All (Forthcoming)
Instant New York Times Bestselling Author of Empire of AI Lead Designer of The Pulitzer Center's AI Spotlight Series
Author of The Age of Cryptocurrency and Our Biggest Fight Co-Host of the Money Reimagined Podcast MIT Media Advisor
Global AI Advisor CEO & Co-Founder of XLabs and Ribo One of Forbes’ 30 Women in AI to Watch Artificial Intelligence Pioneer
Speaker on AI and Education Executive Director of the Stanford Accelerator for Learning
Former CEO, Everyday Robots, Google’s Pioneering AI and Robotics Moonshot
Instant New York Times Bestselling Author of Empire of AI Lead Designer of The Pulitzer Center's AI Spotlight Series
Author of Grit, the #1 New York Times Bestseller | Pioneering Researcher on Grit, Perseverance, and the Science of Success
2024 Nobel Prize Winner | 3rd Most Cited Economist in the World | MIT Institute Professor | Bestselling Co-Author of Why Nations Fail and Power and Progress
Harvard Business School Behavioral Science Professor | "40 Under 40 MBA Professor" | Author of TALK: The Science of Conversation and the Art of Being Ourselves
#1 New York Times Bestselling Co-Author of Abundance | Host of thePlain English Podcast | Founder of the Substack Derek Thompson
#1 New York Times Bestselling Author of How the Word Is Passed and Above Ground | The Atlantic Staff Writer
It’s one of the most polarizing pieces of advice that we hear: “Go with your gut.” Many of us disregard our intuition in favor of gathering more and more data. But in an age where AI is rapidly taking over decision-making, Laura Huang argues that our intuition is the most important thing setting high performers apart. And more importantly, she teaches us how to hone it.
In this talk, Laura discusses her research on decision-making in organizations, and how you can combine both data and gut feel to make better decisions. Drawing on her fascinating book, You Already Know, she reveals how individuals and organizations alike can make better decisions by combining our unique experience with the data we already have.
Laura scientifically breaks down what happens during the intuiting process and details the personified, physical, emotional, and cognitive components of the gut feel that results. She shares real-life examples of ways you can leverage your intuition—like meeting someone three different times and in three different contexts before you hire them (and how you can do that in only 45 minutes). And she provides valuable exercises to help you recognize, understand, and strengthen your intuition:
This talk is a must-listen for leaders, managers, individual contributors, and everyone looking to use what they already know to make better decisions in the day-to-day.
Despite the transformative nature of artificial intelligence and data analytics, what underlies these technologies and tools are human capabilities, innovative uncertainty, and complex information sources. If we can include our own authentic human intelligence in the conversation around AI, we’ll gain a more positive, balanced, and sophisticated AI strategy.
Drawing from her award-winning research on perceptions, signals, and human behavior, Laura Huang integrates her human-centric perspective to show how the artificially-intelligent (AI) perspective is only as good as our ability to recognize the authentic and a behaviorally-intelligent perspective.
Biases and inaccurate perceptions exist in the workplace. But if we find our edge and flip the narrative, we can use these perceptions to our advantage and create an inclusive organizational culture of belongingness. In this talk, Laura Huang explores the research that’s been done on workplace culture and organizational climate, and shows us the actions we can take to make a difference. She empowers us with practical tools and tactics to leverage our range of backgrounds and career paths to support, inspire and make a sustainable impact. Laura shows us how we can communicate clearly, develop an inclusive culture from the outside and from the inside, and foster an environment where everyone can bring their unique edge to work.
When we think about “inclusivity,” most of us shift our mindset to center underrepresented groups. Yet Laura Huang argues that inclusivity entails including all voices without bias and provides a ground-breaking approach where we can aim for, and talk about, inclusion in a way that doesn’t lead to the political or emotional polarization.
With her realistic approach, inclusion is truly all-inclusive. She offers ways that leaders can promote both outside-in (macro, big-picture) and inside-out solutions (practical and empowering). Filled with real-world examples and actionable strategies, this talk inspires leaders to think of everyone’s experiences in a much broader way, going beyond mere representation and ultimately building stronger, more resilient teams that thrive on the richness of varied experiences and perspectives.