Named a “Crisis Leadership Expert” in The Financial Times and widely noted for his thought leadership in navigating turbulent times.

Contact the following representatives to work with Eric:

Eric connects with audiences at workshops, live keynotes, and virtual events. Listeners leave with actionable insights, excited to take on challenges and make positive change within their organizations and communities. Here are some of his current speaking topics enjoyed by scores of audiences around the world.

“Eric McNulty is a rare talent: equal parts thought leader, storyteller, and teacher. His views on leadership are breakthrough yet accessible to senior and aspiring leaders alike. If your organization is searching for an authority on leadership, bring Eric in to speak. You and your audience will be delighted with your decision.”

Eric Lowitt, Managing Director, Nexus Global Advisors

Choose Your Topic

Navigating Turbulent Times: Building Communities of Leading

As organizations and communities face ever-more complex challenges, how we think about leading needs to change as well. Drawing on extensive research on leading through crisis and change as well as compelling examples, Eric reveals the power of humans’ natural collaborative instincts. He explores some of the fundamental shifts required to meet the future with hope and confidence. These include moving from a scarcity to an abundance mindset–seeing the leadership potential in everyone–rather than relying on individual heroes. Eric draws on real-world events as well as cutting-edge research to chart a path forward to a just and abundant future.

What the audience will take away from this presentation:

  • How to steward large teams towards meaningful success (and create an environment people will love to work in).

  • How to transition from command-and-control to a service mindset that brings out the best in people, enhances engagement, and improves results.

  • Innovative and inspiring, a 2023 client called this talk, “captivating and moving, and a huge hit.”

  • You’ll also learn to see individual performance in a new light, one that unlocks potential across your team and organization.

Leading through Crisis and Change

It’s impossible to prepare for every contingency. Yet there are essential skills and techniques you can learn to face high-stakes moments with confidence.

Guiding a team or organization through crisis and change begins comfort with ambiguity. You will never know everything, yet you have to act. Effective crisis leaders build islands of certainty around core values and principles that restore calm and foster resilience amidst the chaos. Eric shows you how to navigate even the most turbulent situations so you, too, can confidently take the reins in any challenge.

“Eric is an accomplished speaker and possesses the ability to keep large groups intrigued and engaged while presenting complex materials – no small feat!”
Sidney Hoffman, FEMA

What the audience will take away from this presentation:

  • The three dimensions of the powerful meta-leadership framework and practice method that empower you to lead more intentionally and confidently.

  • How to establish a culture of trust and accountability that focus and ground both small teams and large, no matter the challenge.

  • Sometimes crises emerge from our organization’s own actions, and sometimes they’re an unexpected shock. Learn how to prepare for multiple futures, both foreseeable and difficult to discern—so you’re ready to nimbly address whatever reality unfolds.
  • Learn how to act swiftly and with courage. In this hyper-connected world, our actions are felt around the world in an instant. We just don’t have as much time to think about how to respond in a crisis.

The Deeply Human, Deeply Social Future of Work

While the bells-and-whistles of the latest technology get the most attention, people will continue to want to work together. We are a social species with instinctual urges to collaborate. The future of work will call people to team up to tackle ever-more complex problems with greater urgency. That means a transition from organizations build for stability and predictability to structures optimized for fluidity and adaptive capacity. Leading such organizations will require the ability to sense-and-respond rapidly amidst ambiguity and unpredictability.

“Eric is a fantastic communicator and really engaged us as participants.”

Corinna Grimes, Atlantic Fellows

What the audience will take away from this presentation:

  • An appreciation of how to leverage the dynamics of complex adaptive systems to achieve positive outcomes.

  • How to foster high accountabilty while empowering distributed leadership and decision-making.

  • Powerful ways to use values, purpose, and trust to counter volatility, uncertainty, and ambiguity.

  • Learn how intentional behavioral norms can enable speed with minimal conflict and friction.

Leading to Solve “Wicked” Problems

People dedicated to environmental, humanitarian, social justice, and other seemingly intractable challenges often find themselves called to lead, yet without the solid skills to do so. Tackling these complex challenges require what Eric calls ‘Big C’ change and ‘lower-case l’ leading—people at all levels, leading from where they are and making an impact locally and globally. This talk is ideal for audiences of scientists, humanitarians, physicians, policy makers, and activists who want to amplify their impact and effectiveness in addressing system-scale issues.

Passionate and insightful about the devastating domino effects of climate change, urbanization, biodiversity loss and other system-scale shifts, Eric leans into the thinking and practices that turn “accidental” leaders into purposeful, effective intentional leaders ready to use their talents and skills to create a more just and thriving world.

“Eric gave a one-day seminar on Meta-Leadership and Conflict Resolution at UCSD. Our feedback survey was relentlessly positive scores; it is rare to see top box numbers over 95% like his are.”
David Granet, UCSD Health

What the audience will take away from this presentation:

  • How to turn technical knowledge and mastery into the behaviors and actions that inspire transformational change.

  • Explore four long-term trends fueling global disruption—and where each presents opportunities as well as challenges.

  • Expand your thinking to incorporate a systems-perspective as you develop strategies for tackling social and environmental issues.

  • Learn how to tap into natual human instincts for cooperation and altruism to unify otherwise divergent stakeholders to forge common cause.

Eric works with visual storyteller Heather Willems of Two Line Studios to add an extra dimension to workshops and presentations.