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  1. Home
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  3. Laura Gassner Otting
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Laura Gassner Otting

Founder and Chief Operating Officer
Limitless Possibility
Country or state 
United States
Available to 
Global
Fee 
Ask for pricing
Languages 
English
Volunteer
Yes

Personal Details

Bio

Laura Gassner Otting - Professional Motivational Keynote Speaker - helps innovators, idealists, and iconoclasts get “unstuck” in their thinking - and achieve extraordinary results.

As a professional female keynote speaker, Laura inspires audiences to push past the doubt and indecision that consign great ideas to limbo. Her motivational presentations encourage professionals to think bigger and accept greater challenges beyond their current limited scope of belief. She delivers strategic thinking, well-honed wisdom, and catalytic perspective informed by decades of navigating change across the start-up, nonprofit, political, and philanthropic landscapes. Laura dares listeners to identify their voice, and generate the confidence necessary to tackle bigger-than-life challenges while exploring innovate ways of leading, managing, and mentoring others.

Laura’s 25-year resume is defined by her entrepreneurial edge. She served as a Presidential Appointee in Bill Clinton’s White House, helping shape AmeriCorps; left a leadership role at respected nonprofit search firm, Isaacson, Miller, to expand the startup ExecSearches.com. She founded and ran the Nonprofit Professionals Advisory Group, which partnered with the full gamut of mission-driven nonprofit executives, from start-up dreamers to scaling social entrepreneurs to global philanthropists. She is the author of Mission-Driven, a book for those moving from profit to purpose.

Through her commitment to give back, Laura has helped build a local Montessori school, co-founded a women’s philanthropic initiative, advised a start-up national women’s PAC, grew a citizen-leadership development program, and completed three charity-inspired marathons—projects emblematic of her passions and values. She is turned on by the audacity of The Big Idea and that larger-than-life goal you just can’t seem to shake. She is an instigator, a motivator, and a provocateur, and she has never met a revolution she didn’t like.

Current position (1)

Founder and Chief Operating Officer

Limitless Possibility

Degrees (2)
Bachelor of Arts
University of Texas at Austin
1987 to 1990
MA, Graduate School of Political Management
George Washington University
1994 to 1995

Presentations

Presentations (4)
The Limitless Leader: Engaging Your Full Workforce (Aimed at Managers/Leaders)

Demographic shifts in the workforce have led to conversations about purpose and meaning that have heretofore never been had. Millennials, GenXers, and Boomers alike are all demanding that their work matters more. And, yet, only one-third of the US workforce reports that they are actively engaged in their work. Why? Because we are using an outdated scorecard which measures the value of a job – title, money, prestige, among others – without adding in the most important part of the equation: the employee. We know that engaged workers are 22% more productive and profitable for their employers, but what recruits the employee doesn’t retain them. In this talk, 20-year executive search veteran Laura Gassner Otting teaches leaders how to unlock their employees’ engagement to not only make them limitless, but make their companies and their profits limitless too.

What if Success Doesn’t Equal Happiness? Learning to Live Limitlessly (Aimed at All Audiences)

Many of us spend our lives pursuing a singular idea of success, one that was created for us by someone else. We give votes to those who shouldn’t even have voices and strive to go faster and faster even as we find ourselves falling further and further behind. We chase gold stars, we check all the boxes, we Lean In – and we still feel incomplete. In this keynote, Laura Gassner Otting teaches you how to ignore the rules that created your limits, align your energies and your actions, and do work that really matters so that you can live your best life. Often described as “a kick in the ass surrounded by a warm hug,” Laura brings both tough love and wisdom and offers a no-holds-barred look at what it really takes to get out of your own way and earn your success today. Aimed at entrepreneurs and misfits, idealists and dreamers, as well as anyone seeking to align who they are with what they do, this talk lights a fire within that catalyzes energy and excitement towards becoming the change age

Contagious Confidence: Mastering Your Leadership Voice (Aimed at Leadership Development Audiences)

Self-doubt and uncertainty consign great ideas to limbo, hindering your team from exploring the big opportunities that will differentiate your company and disrupt the marketplace. That changes now. Through this interactive experience, Laura catalyzes the confidence of audience members, so that your up-and-coming talent can fully embody that aspirational state of leadership, and leave understanding what they need to do to activate that leader inside of themselves. Together, they explore this mindset, the actions it inspires and how, together, they create a momentum of contagious confidence which can’t be reversed. Audience members leave with a physical manifestation of their own personalized roadmap directing them to find and own the very core of their leadership voice, and with the confidence to make that dream a reality.

The Key to Solving Big Problems: Stop Asking “How Can I Help?” (Aimed at Nonprofit Executives)

Do you feel called to serve? Have what it takes to solve the big problems? Each time we hear of a terrible situation, in our homes, our communities, our places of work, or the world at large, we ask ourselves, “How Can I Help?” As a result, we get in the way of actually helping. In this talk, which first debuted on the TEDxCambridge stage and shared online thousands of times, Laura implores audiences to stop asking this question and to ask a better one, one that brings a fundamental shift in how we go about solving our most vexing of problems. This presentation reframes the question and gets entrepreneurs, staff, donors, volunteers, and investors out of their own way, avoiding the martyrdom, the burnout, and the malaise that sets in overtime with entrepreneurs and founders so that we can finally solve the big problems that plague us all. (Spoiler alert! It also works with our little everyday problems, too!)

Past talks (1)
Stop Asking “How Can I Help?”
TEDxCambridge
Cambridge, MA
December 31, 2015
  • All (2)
  • Videos
  • Photos (1)
  • One sheet (1)
This speaker hasn't uploaded any videos yet.
Laura Gassner Otting TEDx Cambridge
Laura Gassner Otting TEDx Cambridge
This speaker hasn't uploaded any slides yet.
This speaker hasn't uploaded any press information yet.

Books & Articles (16)

Limitless: How to Ignore Everybody, Carve your Own Path, and Live Your Best Life
Ideapress Publishing,
2019
Mission Driven: Moving from Profit to Purpose
Elevate Publishing,
2015
Change Your Career: Transitioning to the Nonprofit Sector: Shifting Your Focus from the Bottom Line to a Better World
Kaplan,
2007
The Non-Obvious Guide To Doing Work That Matters
Ideapress Publishing,
2018
How to Achieve Life-Changing Goals
5 Secret Ingredients for Leaders to Succeed
The Confidence to be Wrong
See Your Own Greatness
Be the Party of Possible
Rock Your Moxie - Sleeveless or Not
Say Yes Better
Everything is an Opportunity if You Look Hard Enough
The Confidence to Trust Yourself
The Lion Doesn't Turn Around When the Small Dog Barks
The Worst Advice
TEDx Speaking Opportunity - What I Learned from Doing the Thing that Scared Me Most

Expertise (44)

Business
Leadership
Social & Political
Philanthropy Authentic Leadership Being an Entrepreneur Non-profit Social Impact Motivation Business motivation American Politics Political Startup Servant Leadership badass women Impactful Keynote Speaker Keynote interactive keynote speaker Keynote Speaker Gender Balanced Presenters Gender Bias Gender equality gender equality in careers Equality Equality and Diversity LGBTQ Authentic Corporate Culture Breaking Free from Corporate-limiting Beliefs Corporate Awareness Breaking Unhealthy Business Patterns Confidence build confidence and take action Communicating with Confidence Confidence Confidence and Charisma Confidence building Confidence in leadership confidence in sales Confidence-Driven Performance Civility and the Workplace conscious workplace culture enhancing workplace culture Happiness in the workplace

Reviews

Testimonials (8)
  • Want a no-nonsense speaker who can both charm and change your audience? Then hire Laura. You can always count on her to deliver the hard truths of business, leadership, and success -- all while keeping the audience engaged and entertained.
    Tamsen Websterq
    Verified
  • I have had the privilege of working with Laura and to think of some simple words to sum up her awesomeness is quite a challenge. She is dynamic, passionate and inspires action in her audiences. Her passion to inspire positive change in others is ever present and she is a complete pro in all that she does. I highly recommend Laura for your next event.
    Phil Jones
    Verified
  • Laura spoke for American Dream U at our event at Camp Zama, Japan. She shared the opportunities that the transitioning men and women of our Nation's military have in the nonprofit world. She helped the audience think outside the box when it comes to transitioning back into the civilian workforce. We can't wait to have her speak at another military installation in the future!
    Jess Holland
    Verified
  • Laura was great! The talk was extremely interesting, engaging and concrete. As the host of the event I got a lot of positive feedback from the audience members after the session!
    Shira Weinberg
    Verified
  • We had the pleasure of having Laura speak at our Nonprofit Symposium in Los Angeles and San Francisco. Leading up to the event, she and her team were easy to work which eliminated a lot of the stress that goes into planning a conference. Laura brings years of experience, insight, and enthusiasm to her presentations. I would definitely recommend booking Laura if you're looking for someone who is intelligent, fun to work with, dependable, and an all around great presenter.
    Maggie Ortlieb
    Verified
  • Laura was such a captivating speaker! She connected to our audience of volunteers, who are a really diverse bunch, authentically and kept them engaged.
    Renata Bule
  • It was a joy to have Laura come speak to our Strong Women, Strong Girls college mentors at our annual mentor appreciation event, Strong Awards. Laura has a long history with the organization so her time and energy meant a lot. For a group of young women who are exploring who they are and what they want to do in the world, Laura’s words were powerful. Thank you, Laura, for reminding us to focus not on “nice” but “kind”.
    Siiri Morley
    Verified
  • Laura is charismatic, engaging, and sensationally real. Her talk brought up issues that virtually everyone has faced at work, and yet so few of us know how to handle well (how to manage a difficult boss, what to do when someone else takes credit for your work, tips for keeping up momentum, etc.). She has a way of breaking down the steps to success that feels manageable, and providing the audience with a guide for feeling better and doing better at work.
    Jessie Zimmerer
    Verified
Recommendations
Marcus A. Wright's picture
Marcus A.
Wright
Emotional Intelligence Certified
Marcus A. Wright, LLC
11 Audience
Show More
Why choose me? 

Laura helps innovators, idealists, and iconoclasts get “unstuck” — and achieve extraordinary results

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