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Niall Ferguson
Featured Videos
Mark Kennedy: Ten Steps to Win the AI Race
Mark Kennedy: Issues Driving the U.S. Foreign Policy Debate
Mark Kennedy: Leading in the Age of Activism
Mark Kennedy: From Jedi to Leaders in Action
Speech Topics
In a world of fractured alliances and rival tech ecosystems, strategic competition isn’t a single fight—it’s a system-wide test of alignment, trust, and execution. In this powerful keynote, Mark Kennedy explains why winning today’s geopolitical contest requires more than capability—it demands coherence.
Audiences will walk away with a shared language for navigating complexity, grounded in Kennedy’s GRIPS, PIVOT, and ALIGN frameworks. Whether in boardrooms, ministries, or universities, Mark delivers a roadmap for leading with clarity in a contested, interdependent world.
Audience Takeaways:
- How democracies can compete without fragmentation
- Why trust, not just strength, defines strategic advantage
- A practical framework to align strategy, systems, and execution
Markets have become battlegrounds. In this provocative talk, Kennedy shows how finance, trade, and development are now frontline tools of global power. From supply chain controls to infrastructure finance, he explores how open societies can lead through aligned geoeconomic strategy.
This is a must-hear for leaders navigating sanctions, export controls, new trade regimes, or the rise of alternative financial blocs.
Audience Takeaways:
- Why rules-based trade must be strategic—not just liberal
- How to harness infrastructure and investment for alignment
- What economic resilience looks like in a multipolar world
Alliances must evolve from last-resort defense pacts into full-spectrum partnerships—spanning tech, trade, regulation, and governance. Mark Kennedy draws on high-level policy experience to reveal how alliances like NATO, AUKUS, IPEF, and the Quad must modernize for resilience and relevance.
Ideal for summits, foreign ministries, or industries embedded in alliance-driven ecosystems.
Audience Takeaways:
- The future of alliances: not just defense, but direction
- Lessons from digital cooperation and Indo-Pacific frameworks
- The strategic role of industry in alliance modernization
From AI standards to semiconductors and data flows, Kennedy reveals how technology is the frontline of modern competition—and why democracies must shape interoperable, values-based digital ecosystems.
This keynote speaks directly to public and private actors navigating a shifting digital order, offering clarity on policy, alignment, and responsible innovation.
Audience Takeaways:
- How democracies can lead through digital governance
- Why trust, not dominance, defines tech power
- Real-world playbook for building tech alliances that last
Can democracies lead in AI, chips, and cloud without compromising their identity? In this inspiring talk, Kennedy lays out how to embed values in tech strategy—balancing innovation, security, and civil liberties.
It’s not just about speed—it’s about what kind of future we’re building. This keynote is ideal for conferences at the intersection of tech, ethics, and national strategy.
Audience Takeaways:
- Why values are strategic assets in digital leadership
- How to embed resilience into AI and infrastructure
- Strategies to avoid decoupling while competing boldly
In a world of contested interdependence, the answer isn’t self-sufficiency—it’s trusted interdependence. Mark Kennedy challenges the myth of go-it-alone resilience and makes the case for federated supply chains and coalition-driven industrial policy.
From COVID-era shortages to semiconductor geopolitics, this keynote equips leaders to build systems that bend—but don’t break.
Audience Takeaways:
- How to de-risk supply chains without triggering nationalism
- Why resilience is now a shared strategic mission
- How alliances can harden economic infrastructure, not just military defense
Infrastructure is no longer neutral—it’s geopolitical. From power grids to data cables, Mark Kennedy shows how strategic infrastructure now defines alignment, access, and influence.
This keynote helps leaders reimagine infrastructure as connective tissue in an era of systemic competition—and makes the case for transparent, values-driven investment.
Audience Takeaways:
- How digital, energy, and transport infrastructure shape deterrence
- Lessons from BRI, PGII, IPEF, and the Blue Dot Network
- A strategic roadmap for government, industry, and multilateral alignment
Democracy is not self-executing. In this urgent and inspiring keynote, Mark Kennedy outlines how governance must become a strategic discipline—designed for agility, trust, and performance.
Ideal for global forums, reform-minded institutions, and civic leaders, this talk delivers a framework for democratic strength across digital, civic, and institutional domains.
Audience Takeaways:
- Why democratic systems must now compete on effectiveness
- How to align governance with resilience, legitimacy, and trust
- Practical tools for public-private-civic collaboration in contested spaces
Biography
The only person to have served as a senior officer of a Fortune 100 company, a U.S. Congressman, and president of a flagship public research university, Mark Kennedy delivers keynotes that equip leaders to compete with clarity in an age of disruption.
As Founding Director of the Wahba Institute for Strategic Competition, Kennedy crafts policy strategies that align open societies against authoritarian threats—focusing on trusted technology alliances, resilient supply chains, and the digital rules that shape power. His GRIPS, PIVOT, and ALIGN frameworks help executives, policymakers, and educators to diagnose posture, reinforce systems, and convert strategy into execution.
Through his Mind the Gap series, Kennedy exposes how failure often results not from flawed ambition, but from misaligned systems—offering leaders a roadmap for building institutional coherence and trust.
He is also the author of Shapeholders: Business Success in the Age of Activism (Columbia University Press), which redefines how leaders engage those who influence an organization’s risks and opportunities—even without holding a stake in its success. Kennedy applied these principles firsthand while helping lead Federated Department Stores through what was then the largest non-oil merger and corporate reorganization in U.S. history—a transformation that created today’s Macy’s.
A first-generation college graduate, Kennedy’s career spans business, government, and academia. He has led through some of the 21st century’s most defining disruptions: navigating the aftermath of 9/11 as a member of Congress, guiding the University of North Dakota through a major oil bust, and steering the University of Colorado system through the COVID-19 pandemic. Across each, he earned trust by aligning shapeholders and systems toward mission-first resilience.
He has engaged leaders and learners alike in more than 45 countries—meeting with heads of state, senior ministers, civic leaders, and students in settings ranging from world capitals to war zones, refugee camps, military bases, and aircraft carriers at sea.
His keynotes blend geopolitical foresight with institutional insight, equipping audiences to navigate disruption with clarity and courage.
Mark Kennedy delivers more than a speech—he delivers a 360° lens for leadership in a contested world. Book him to help your audience build coherence, navigate complexity, and lead with trust.
[Mark delivered] insights on the state of affairs in Europe, the Middle East, and East Asia. We are living in a global world where political, economic, and social forces are deeply interconnected. His interaction and engagement made the burning issues much more transparent and actionable for our business leaders.
Siemens Turkey Executive
Mark Kennedy offers a rare combination of strategic clarity and diplomatic respect. His keynote in Hanoi provided valuable insights into global AI and digitization trends while thoughtfully engaging Vietnam’s Central Theoretical Council. At Harvard, his remarks at the Boston Global Forum inspired deep thinking about how technology can be governed in a way that advances openness, cooperation, and human dignity. Mark bridges policy, technology, and values in a way few speakers can.
CEO, The Boston Global Forum
As good as you are on strategic competition and infrastructure, you're even better when drawing on your Congressional experience. Your shrewd, nonpartisan insights into the first branch of government and today’s party dynamics are why you’re in such demand.
Director, Canada Institute
Your help moderating the session on supply chains and critical minerals was invaluable in making the event a success. The feedback we’ve received has been overwhelmingly positive, with attendees praising the depth of discussions and the actionable ideas that emerged.
Deputy CEO, U.S. International Development Finance Corporation
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