Meet our guest: Holly Ransom
“It’s questions that give credibility to their answers, not the other way around.”
Holly is a globally renowned content curator, powerful speaker and master questioner with belief that if you walk past it, you tell the world it’s okay. Having interviewed the likes of Barack Obama, Richard Branson, Billie Jean-King and Condoleezza Rice, Holly fights complexity with curiosity, apathy with empowerment and fear with fact. Soon to release her book The Leading Edge, Holly helps people harness their own potential to lead by asking better questions, thinking beyond biased answers and building collective momentum for change.
As the world emerges from COVID19, Holly believes a groundswell of brave leaders must step forward to shape the new world. She makes the case that the way we teach leadership has not changed for decades. In The Leading Edge, Holly brings the real-world leadership lessons of so many diverse thinkers and pioneers she’s met to the fore. Fortunately, when we shift our field of view there are points of light everywhere to inspire us. Leaders who are diverse. Leaders who are listening. Leaders who are big-hearted and sharp-witted. Leadership is within every single one of us, we just need to know how to activate it.
Holly was identified early as a dynamic thought leader, asked to Co- Chair the G20 Youth Summit in 2014, the United Nations Coalition of Young Women Entrepreneurs in 2016, and becoming the youngest Director to be appointed to an Australian Football Club. Named one of Australia’s 100 Most Influential Women by the Australian Financial Review, Holly has delivered a Peace Charter to the Dalai Lama and was Sir Richard Branson’s nominee for Wired Magazine’s ‘Smart List’ of Future Game Changers to watch in 2017. Holly’s podcast ‘Coffee Pods’ was named in the top ten business podcasts to listen to by the Sydney Morning Herald in 2018, and Holly has been recognized as a LinkedIn Influencer and a credible content producer by the Australian Institute of Company Directors.
Herself an accomplished company director, Holly has compressed a power-packed career into a decade, spanning corporate, non-profit and public sectors. As founder and CEO of consulting firm Emergent, Holly has led real-world results with clients such as P&G, Microsoft, Virgin, Cisco and KPMG. Holly’s track record demonstrates success in developing strategic policy frameworks that balance economic and commercial interests with social and ethical ramifications.
As a Harvard Kennedy School Class of ’21 fellow, and a recipient of the prestigious Anne Wexler Public Policy Scholarship, Holly has long held a passion for social and economic inclusion that today sees her specializing in collaborative policy design. Holly’s driving ambition is to connect people to the decisions that affect their lives.
Holly is a 2010 Zonta International Jane M. Klausman Women in Business District Scholar.