Travels from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA
Natalie Nixon's speaking fee falls within range: $30,000 to $50,000
Natalie Nixon, PhD, is an idea artist.
She democratizes creativity—showing that while artists are masters at navigating ambiguity, creativity is equally inherent to the work of engineers, scientists, lawyers, and project managers who are ready to think differently, lead with intention, and shape the future.
Natalie built her career by connecting dots others didn’t see — working in global apparel sourcing for The Limited Brands in Sri Lanka and Portugal, earning a PhD in design management while working full time, leading executive education programs, and spending 16 years as a professor at Thomas Jefferson University. Her experience living and working across five countries shaped her global perspective and sharpened her approach to helping teams adapt, innovate, and thrive in ambiguity.
Years ago, Natalie sat at her kitchen table, weighing a leap of faith. After years in academia, she realized she was ready for something more audacious. She created her own path — becoming a creativity strategist before the role even had a name. It was her first real test of WonderRigor™: balancing audacity with discipline to reimagine her future.
Natalie’s lifelong passions, from modern, ballroom, and hip-hop dance to open-water swimming, continue to fuel her insights into leadership, adaptability, and innovation.
Today, Natalie is recognized among the top keynote speakers by BigSpeak and Real Leaders, named to the Thinkers50 Radar List, and honored by Core77 as a leader in women-driven innovation. She’s the award-winning author of The Creativity Leap and the forthcoming Move. Think. Rest.
MOVE. THINK. REST. - Building Regenerative Teams for The Future of Work
What if your organization’s greatest competitive advantage wasn’t grinding harder, but thinking deeper? Burnout is not inevitable—it’s a design choice. Natalie Nixon, a creativity strategist, reveals how movement, strategic thinking, and intentional rest activate your team’s creative capacity for consistent innovation. Learn to embed regenerative rhythms into your culture, build momentum with meaning, and achieve extraordinary business results without sacrificing wellbeing.
THE NEW I IN AI - Imagination, Inquiry and Intuition
Worried about how you’ll find your edge in Al? At its BEST, Al enhances human qualities at work. Natalie Nixon, a renowned creativity strategist, advocates for leveraging curiosity, imagination, and intuition to navigate this evolving landscape. Her keynote offers practical insights to redesign work and thrive in the changing paradigm.
ADAPT AND DISRUPT - Build Creativity’s Business ROI in The Imagination Era
In the age of AI dominance, creativity is not optional—it’s essential. Natalie Nixon, a creativity expert, reveals how imagination drives business success. Learn from pioneering leaders, adopt dynamic methods, and unleash creativity to secure your organization’s strategic edge. Embrace innovation, wield imagination, and thrive in disruption.
“Natalie Nixon can help you get unstuck and unlock the work you were born to do.” – SETH GODIN, AUTHOR, ENTREPRENEUR, TEACHER
“Natalie Nixon offers a fresh way of thinking about creativity-as an essential skill that is absolutely critical to success in today’s world.” – WARREN BERGER, AMERICAN JOURNALIST AND AUTHOR
“Natalie spoke to a select group of our most valued business partners and employees at our annual meeting, and she hit an absolute home run. Centered on change and what is required in a fast paced, high growth environment to adapt and thrive, Natalie was on point and impactful. As a speaker, Natalie is warm, engaging, thoughtful and funny all while having absolute command of the audience based on her background and experience in both academia and the corporate world. Virtually every attendee declared Natalie “the best hour of the entire conference!” – Mike Fouts, VP, Citrix
“Natalie’s presentation on creativity was engaging, inspiring, and practical! Her framework and practical suggestions for creativity were incredibly valuable.” – Andrea Leszek, EVP & COO of Technology, Salesforce
“Working with Dr. Natalie Nixon has been a true pleasure! The virtual keynote was insightful, engaging and inspirational, and the topic – “What to do when there is no playbook” – so well aligned with this moment in time. We particularly appreciated Dr. Nixon’s collaborative approach and interest in understanding our company and aligning with our global audience.” – Roxana Tanase, Global Early Career Program Manager, Microsoft
“Natalie Nixon brought experience and insights to help our team focus on the incredible possibility that wonder and rigor can bring to our organization. Our entire team was energized by the session and continue to infuse her teachings in our day to day culture.” – Tracey Santilli, Chief Growth Officer, Tierney
“Natalie’s talk with our team expanded the aperture of how creativity can be amplified and what we can do to enhance the creativity we foster with our professional staff. She provided tangible action steps Ansira can take to ensure we are bringing the best and most creative ideas to serve our clients.” – Jay Dettling, CEO, Ansira
“As Natalie describes in her important new book, creativity requires holding both wonder and rigor in productive tension. She shared this and other actionable wisdom recently with our team at SYPartners. Natalie dismantles the idea that creativity is the domain of the few, and shows how everyone can take the creativity leap.” – Jessica Orkin, CEO, Sypartners
“Natalie is a dynamic speaker and design strategist. She provided great examples and insights on bolstering creativity to my colleagues at Fjord/Accenture, during our Diverse Voices in Design virtual talk. The event received great feedback. Additionally, many of my colleagues left inspired and were excited to apply The Creativity Leap principles to their toolkit.” – Brandon Ball, Business Designer at Fjord
“Natalie’s keynote on Adaptation and Disruption could not be more timely for Best Buy as we continue to evolve and iterate in the ever changing macro business environment. Her presentation was very well attended – including our CEO Corie Barry. …Most importantly the feedback we have received post keynote has been tremendous on leveraging your message of adaption and creativity. I have no doubt we will see individuals think about their work with a much more customer obsessed mindset. What an awesome start to TechCon 2020!” – Scott Vuong, Director of Spend Efficiency, Bestbuy
“At KES, our mission is to inspire leaders and organizations to imagine the future, instead of reacting to it. Natalie did a superb job at that, as she provoked our client, Twitter, but also brought tangible ways in which they can exercise their creativity and improvisational skills. Looking forward to working with her again!” – Daphne Diamond, COO and Head of Curatorship, KES Brazil
“Recently, Steelcase and Corporate Interiors had the pleasure of hosting Dr. Nixon on a webinar where she discussed the key themes from the research she conducted for her upcoming book, The Creativity Leap. Not only was Dr. Nixon able to engage over 40 people for an hour but she was able to relate to the audience with great storytelling and images that made us all feel as if we too had the ability to be super-creatives. She’s obviously passionate about her research and what drives human behavior and inspired us all to deeply understand ourselves and how we can all thrive in times of uncertainty and change.” – Keith Mcmillon, Regional Education Leader, Steelcase
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The Creativity Leap: Unleash Curiosity, Improvisation, and Intuition at Work
Too many people associate creativity solely with the arts, even though to be an incredible scientist, engineer, or entrepreneur requires immense creativity. And it’s the key to developing breakthrough products and services. Natalie Nixon, a creativity strategist with a background in cultural anthropology, fashion, and service design, says that in the fourth industrial revolution a creativity leap is needed to bridge the gap that exists between the churn of work and the highly sought-after prize called innovation.
Nixon says that since humans are hardwired to be creative, it is a competency anyone can develop. She shows that it balances wonder (awe, audacity, and curiosity) with rigor (discipline, skill-building, and attention to detail), and that inquiry, improvisation, and intuition are the key practices that increase those capacities. Drawing on interviews with fifty-six people from diverse backgrounds–farming, law, plumbing, architecture, perfumery, medicine, education, technology, and more–she offers illuminating examples of how creativity manifests in every kind of work.
Combining creativity tools and techniques with real-world stories of innovative people and businesses, this book is a provocation, an inspiration, and an invitation to unleash the innate creativity that lies within each of us. It offers a more dynamic and integrative way to adapt and innovate, one that allows us the freedom to access our full human selves.
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