Ross Dawson

Ross’s global reputation and extensive experience across a variety of industries around the world makes him a favourite keynote speaker for client conferences of major technology and professional service firms and for internal strategy meetings of boards, executives and extended management teams. His inspirational and pragmatic style in identifying specific opportunities and the potential of change and the future inspires conference audiences around the world.

Current work

Ross is a deeply inspiring keynote speaker focusing on the potential and opportunities of the future. He most commonly delivers highly customised opening keynotes, setting a visionary, highly positive frame, carefully aligned with the key themes and messages of the conference. He is also commonly called to do closing keynotes, looking forward to the potential and promise of the future. His deep experience in the realities of corporate change and innovation makes his insights engaging, practical and relevant to executives today.

Ross works extensively with boards of directors and executive teams on innovation and future-oriented strategy. He leads the Directing Innovation program of the Australian Institute of Company Directors (AICD) and has run many innovation programs for Institute of Company Directors Malaysia (ICDM). He frequently speaks at or facilitates board and executive strategy offsites for major companies worldwide.

Ross also works as an MC, host and panel facilitator for events targeted at senior executives and professionals. Ross has facilitated client and media-facing events for a wide variety of leading organisations including Factiva, IBM, Oracle, Telstra and Toyota.

Ross is the founding chairman of the Advanced Human Technologies group of companies, including consulting and publishing firm Advanced Human Technologies, futures think-tank Future Exploration Network and Fraxios, a stealth technology startup focused on developing strategic collective intelligence.

Previous experience
Media commentator: Ross frequently appears in the media in Australia and globally, including in publications such as The New York Times, USA Today, Time, The Boston Globe, The Times of London, BBC, The Guardian, Le Monde, Die Welt, El País, Gulf News, Times of India, Australian Financial Review, The Australian and Sydney Morning Herald and TV channels including CNN, Bloomberg TV, ABC, SBS, SkyNews, Today, Sunrise, 7:30 Report and many more. He also hosted the first-ever podcast series by BBC Storyworks.

Media spokesperson: Ross has acted as a spokesperson in major future-oriented media campaigns for leading companies such as ANZ, Arnotts Campbell, Commonwealth Bank, Intel, Officeworks and Visa.

Author: Ross is author of four prescient books including the bestselling Developing Knowledge-Based Client Relationships, now out in its second edition, and the acclaimed Living Networks, which the New York Times credited as accurately predicted the social networking revolution.

Executive educator: Ross has run executive education programs or lectured at many leading institutions worldwide including Australian Graduate School of Management, University of Virginia, Singapore Institute of Management, Institute of Banking and Finance, and Singularity University in Silicon Valley.

Influencer: Ross has been named as one of the most influential people in the world on topics including the future of work, fintech, crowdfunding, and Enterprise 2.0, as well as one of the most influential keynote speakers worldwide on social media. Digital Media magazine has named Ross as one of the 40 biggest players in Australia’s digital age.

Corporate executive: Prior to founding his first company Ross worked for NCR, Merrill Lynch and Thomson Financial in Sydney, Tokyo and London, finally as Global Director – Capital Markets for Thomson, leading its worldwide division focusing on debt capital markets.