Shane Snow | Award-winning tech and media entrepreneur, Tony Award-winning producer, journalist who has been in the running for the Pulitzer-Prize, and author of three bestselling books on the science of human behavior.

Shane Snow

Award-winning tech and media entrepreneur, Tony Award-winning producer, journalist who has been in the running for the Pulitzer-Prize, and author of three bestselling books on the science of human behavior.

Shane Snow
Biography

Shane Snow has helped expose gun traffickers and gender discrimination, eaten only ice cream for weeks in the name of science, and has taught millions of people to work better through his research, bestselling books Smartcuts, The Storytelling Edge, and Dream Teams, and education company, Snow Academy. He is an award-winning tech and media entrepreneur, a Tony Award-winning producer on Broadway, and a journalist whose work has been in the running for the Pulitzer-Prize.

A dynamic storyteller and internationally acclaimed keynote speaker, Snow has been declared a “wunderkind" by The New York Times, a “maverick” by Details, and his work praised as “insanely addicting” by GQ. He's consistently rated the top speaker at global conferences and private events—with an uncanny ability to get people to drop their phones (unless it's to tweet about their minds being blown), leaving audiences with new ways to approach problem-solving, growth, and teamwork. After hearing Snow speak, people never look at work the same way again.

Snow's writing has appeared in Wired, The New Yorker, Fast Company, The Washington Post, and Harvard Business Review. He has performed comedy on Broadway, produced award-winning films, and founded several companies at the intersection of media and technology, including the business skills training company Snow Academy, the content marketing platform Contently, and the film technology company SHOWRUNNER.
 
In his entertaining and provocative keynote presentations, Snow shatters common wisdom through gripping stories and surprising research on innovation and human behavior. As the BBC warns, Snow’s ideas "could change your life."
 

Shane Snow
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Shane Snow
Featured Keynote Programs

The Storytelling Edge and How to Transform the Way You Work and Do Business

In this fast-paced keynote, Snow shares the secrets to powerful storytelling, with compelling (and often hilarious) stories and behind-the-scenes insights from his award-winning content company and hit book The Storytelling Edge.

With his signature blend of dramatic narrative and rigorous science, Snow shows not only how each member of the audience can use storytelling to supercharge their jobs, but how stories work at a neurological level, and how our organizations can harness their power to build relationships, make people care, and spur change.

BOOK THIS KEYNOTE IF YOU’RE AIMING TO:

  • Teach your audience the brain-science of stories, and the key elements of world-class storytelling
  • Help your organization master the art of storytelling for marketing, branding, or recruiting
  • Help your group to leverage the power of stories for building relationships—and to use storytelling more effectively in their everyday work
  • Kick off a conference or offsite with energizing and actionable food-for-thought

Smartcuts for Accelerating Innovation & Thinking Differently

Breakthrough innovation happens when we rethink conventional wisdom. But how do you train yourself—or your organization—to think differently? How do you foster an environment where it’s safe to do so, where innovation can thrive without destroying your business?

How do the world’s most clever companies manage to not only endure change, but harness it to climb to new heights? How do rocket makers and children’s hospitals stay alive in the face of market shifts and competitive challenges? What can established businesses learn from revolutionaries, crazy geniuses, and crackpot comedians to help manage changes big and small?

In this clever and surprising keynote, Snow debunks myths of success, shares unforgettable research and stories, and fires audiences up to 11. You will never think the same.

BOOK THIS KEYNOTE IF YOU’RE AIMING TO:

  • Inspire intrapreneurship, and spur your audience to think differently about their current challenges
  • Get your group to work more innovatively—and to get the naysayers on board with new ideas
  • Teach your audience a framework for breakthrough problem solving
  • Kick off a conference or offsite by getting people in a more open-minded place or close out a conference with a bang!

Dream Teams and the Science of Breakthrough Collaboration

This brilliant and entertaining keynote performance will change the way you think about people, progress, and collaboration. 

Shane Snow takes audiences on a rollicking adventure, revealing the secrets of the world’s most successful teams and coalitions in history.

You’ll learn about the surprising factor behind most failed mergers and marriages; how a certain method of fighting is more useful than brainstorming; how leveraging “cognitive diversity” helps groups outmatch competitors; the science of becoming open-minded—and the outsize effect it has on group success; and the counter-intuitive truths about becoming better team players ourselves.

BOOK THIS KEYNOTE IF YOU’RE AIMING TO:

  • Create high functioning, hyper efficient, and highly effective teams
  • Deal with people more effectively, saving time and solving problems in more innovative ways
  • Debate smarter, influence better, and help your team get the most out of those around them
  • Help your team get “diversity” right—and learn to leverage differences instead of keeping diversity superficial
  • Turn conflict into fuel for progress—neutralizing negativity, minimizing ego, and learning how to harness “cognitive friction”
  • Inspire people to develop intellectual humility, the #1 skill that will set apart innovators, leaders, and workers in tomorrow’s workplace

VIRTUAL PRESENTATION

An award-winning journalist and author, Shane Snow's work can be found in The New Yorker, GQ, Fast Company, and his three books, the latest of which is Dream Teams. He speaks globally about innovation and teamwork; now, he's transitioned his dynamic on-stage presence to virtual gameshows.

This customized virtual event is tailored to meet your client's needs. It features interactive game play based on the industry and learning objectives, three custom videos for learning breaks throughout the show, and more!

Shane Snow
Featured Books

Dream Teams: Working Together Without Falling Apartby Shane Snow

Dream Teams: Working Together Without Falling Apart

by Shane Snow

Award-winning entrepreneur and journalist Shane Snow reveals the counterintuitive reasons why so many partnerships and groups break down--and why some break through.

The best teams are more than the sum of their parts, but why does collaboration so often fail to fulfill this promise? In Dream Teams, Snow takes us on an adventure through history, neuroscience, psychology, and business, exploring what separates groups that simply get by together from those that get better together.

You'll learn:
  *  How ragtag teams--from soccer clubs to startups to gangs of pirates--beat the odds throughout history.
  *  Why DaimlerChrysler flopped while the Wu-Tang Clan succeeded, and the surprising factor behind most failed mergers, marriages, and partnerships.
  *  What the Wright Brothers' daily arguments can teach us about group problem solving.
  *  Pioneering women in law enforcement, unlikely civil rights collaborators, and underdog armies that did the incredible together.
  *  The team players behind great social movements in history, and the science of becoming open-minded.

Smartcuts: The Breakthrough Power of Lateral Thinkingby Shane Snow

Smartcuts: The Breakthrough Power of Lateral Thinking

by Shane Snow

Serial entrepreneur and journalist Shane Snow delves into the reasons why some people and organizations are able to achieve incredible things in implausibly short time frames, showing how each of us can use these “smartcuts” to rethink convention and accelerate success.

In every era, innovators from art to science to business have used what psychologists call “lateral thinking” to find better routes to stunning accomplishments. Smartcuts shows how they bucked the norm—and how the rest of us can too. Snow shatters common wisdom about success, revealing how conventions like “paying dues” prevent progress, why kids shouldn’t learn multiplication tables, and how, paradoxically, it’s easier to build a huge business than a small one.

Smartcuts tells the stories of people who dared to work differently and lays out practical takeaways for the rest of us. It’s about applying entrepreneurial and technological concepts to success in life and work, and how, by emulation, we too can leapfrog competitors, grow businesses, and fix society’s problems faster than we think.

The Storytelling Edge: How to Transform Your Business, Stop Screaming into the Void, and Make People Love You by Shane Snow

The Storytelling Edge: How to Transform Your Business, Stop Screaming into the Void, and Make People Love You

by Shane Snow

"A terrific and timely book that makes a compelling case for fundamentally rethinking how your business communicates. Recommended!"
―Jay Baer, founder of Convince & Convert and author of Hug Your Haters

"Once upon a time, storytelling was confused with talking at people. Not anymore. Shane and Joe are your narrators in a journey that will transform how you talk to other human beings to be more believable, relevant, compelling and unforgettable."
―Brian Solis, experience architect, digital anthropologist, best-selling author

"Shane Snow and Joe Lazauskas spend the overwhelming majority of their time thinking, writing, and theorizing about brand storytelling - so you don't have to. They're smart and they know this topic inside out (and sideways). Read their book. While I can't guarantee you'll rise to Shane and Joe's ridiculously obsessive level, you will be infinitely better prepared to tell your own brand's story. Promise!"
―Rebecca Lieb, Analyst, Author & Advisor

"The Contently team understands the power of story, and how to craft and spread a great narrative, like no other. In an era where brand, design, and mission are a competitive advantage for every business, Contently underscores the importance of stories and how they transform companies and industries."
―Scott Belsky, Entrepreneur, Investor, & Author (Founder of Behance, bestselling author of Making Ideas Happen)

"I can't think of a better way to illustrate the power of story telling than by telling great stories. This book should be required reading not just by those with content in their titles, but by anyone in Marketing AND Sales. Then, when you're done, give it to your CEO to read... but make sure you get it back, because I guarantee you'll refer to it more than once."
―Shawna Dennis, Senior Marketing Leader

"Neuroscience, algorithms, illustrations, personal anecdotes and good, old-fashioned empathy: This entertaining and informative tome journeys to the core of how we communicate and pushes us, as marketers and humans, to do it better, "speeding the reader through and leaving us wanting more."
―Ann Hynek, VP of global content marketing at Morgan Stanley

Transform your business through the power of storytelling.

Content strategists Joe Lazauskas and Shane Snow offer an insider's guide to transforming your business―and all the relationships that matter to it―through the art and science of telling great stories.

Smart businesses today understand the need to use stories to better connect with the people they care about. But few know how to do it well. In The Storytelling Edge, the strategy minds behind Contently, the world renowned content marketing technology company, reveal their secrets that have helped award-winning brands to build relationships with millions of advocates and customers.

Join as they dive into the neuroscience of storytelling, the elements of powerful stories, and methodologies to grow businesses through engaging and accountable content.

With The Storytelling Edge you will discover how leaders and workers can craft the powerful stories that not only build brands and engage customers, but also build relationships and make people care―in work and in life.

Shane Snow
Featured Reviews

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