Hamza Khan

Speaking topics

Presentations listed below include in-person and virtual keynotes, as well as workshops, fireside chats, and other presentation formats.

• The Bright Side of Leadership: The Complexity of Managing People in the New Normal

  Leadership has been long overdue for reinvention. From activist Colin Kaepernick’s kneeling to monster Harvey Weinstein’s arrest; from the long-overdue ruling in favour of LGBTQ+ workplace protections, to the deafening Black Lives Matter protests; the call for a sweeping reset can no longer be ignored. Enter modern leadership—a system of action that is human-centric, change-friendly, self-disrupting, and value-driven.

  Drawing on contemporary examples of modern leaders such as New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern and Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella, Hamza Khan makes the case that by operationalizing the intertwined values of servitude, innovation, diversity, and empathy, leaders can guarantee that the rate of change inside of their organizations exceeds the rate of change on the outside. Whether you’re a recently promoted leader, a leader on the track to promotion, or a leader keen on shifting your perspective, this talk will help you and your organization to change before you’re forced to change. 

• The Management Paradox: Navigating the Multi-Generational Workforce

  Organizations require management. But can younger generations be managed? And more importantly, in an age of decentralization, connectedness, and resourcefulness, should they be managed? Research by Deloitte predicts that by the year 2025, Generation Y and Generation Z will comprise more than 80% of the modern workforce. But as this contingent grows, so might a misunderstanding and divide between younger and older generations.

  Now with 4 distinct generations attempting to co-exist in the modern (and increasingly remote) workplace, the need for empathy and intergenerational understanding is more important than ever. Speaking through his own experience of being managed and as well as being a manager, Hamza Khan makes the case that younger generations must be lead, instead of managed. And that a delicate balance between autonomy and structure must be established, to ensure organizational harmony and productivity.

• The Burnout Gamble: Achieve More by Beating Burnout & Building Resilience

  According to a recent survey by Ernst & Young, one third of full-time workers globally say that managing work-life has become increasingly difficult. Workers in the United States, Germany, Japan, China, Mexico, Brazil, India, and the United Kingdom revealed that they are working longer hours and harder than ever before, leaving very little time for much else. One could argue that we’re living in a golden age of workplace stress, largely due to the changing role of work in our lives. When work and life blend into each other, how can you begin to achieve an equilibrium that supports your physical, emotional and mental health? Perhaps it’s time to resist the binary construction (or fallacy) that is work-life and consider a new framework altogether. This talk explores the transition from overachiever to high performer.

• Do Things, Tell People: The Power of Personal Branding & Social Media Storytelling

  Have you ever wondered if your digital identity is affecting your chances of landing a job? Would you like to learn how to build an online brand that is appealing to employers? It’s been said that your personal brand is what people say about you when you’re not in the room this session explores the ways in which individuals can begin to understand their personal narrative and communicate it through social media. Stories are the fundamental unit of human understanding. Yet some brands continue to make the mistake of taking their audiences for granted instead treating them with genuine care.

  This session explores how brands can utilize social media to humanize themselves and tell authentic and compelling stories. If you’re looking to run your own business or work to craft the image of someone else’s, this workshop will examine how to use utility, information, amusement, and inspiration as “magic ingredients” to earn the attention, trust, and ultimately the loyalty of online audiences.

• Getting (The Right) Things Done: A Guide to Achieving More Without Burning Out

  Hamza Khan is all-too-familiar with the tendency of overachieving leaders to lose their drive within ambitious and/or successful organizations. He’s someone who once embraced the prevailing notion that longer hours, aggressive hustle, and a “whatever it takes” attitude is required to succeed within the modern workforce. But after experiencing a deadly brush with burnout, his perspective completely changed.

  Today, he directly counters the chaos, anxiety, and stress that plagues millions of organizations and hampers billions of people every day. And in always-on cultures of overwork, the consequences of not working smart can sometimes be fatal. Longer hours, an excessive workload, and a lack of sleep have become a badge of honour for students and early talent alike. But it should be a mark of foolishness, Khan argues. The answer to better productivity isn’t more hours—it’s less waste and fewer things that induce distraction and persistent stress. It’s time to stop celebrating crazy and start celebrating calm. In this dynamic and engaging workshop, audience members will receive the action-oriented insights that they didn’t get in school, highlighting real-world best practices for getting (the right) things done. Learn how to establish priorities, avoid meeting overload, stay on top of their inboxes, and know with certainty when something is ready to ship. By the end, the audience will embrace the idea that busyness reflects disorganization. And that in order to succeed, they must focus on getting the right things done.

• Human 9000: Navigating The Future of Work with Attunement, Resilience, and Creativity

  McKinsey Global Institute’s report, “Jobs Lost, Jobs Gained: Workforce Transitions in a Time of Automation,” predicts that the world of work will be radically transformed by 2030. Working alongside tireless technology, the demand for more “human” skills—social and emotional skills, as well as other higher-level cognitive skills—particularly critical thinking, creativity, and complex information processing—will dramatically increase. All the while, levels of chronic stress will continue to rise, resulting in an even more massive epidemic of occupational burnout than the World Health Organization has identified today.

  Where will humans fit in tomorrow’s workplace? And how can leaders help them to thrive? The solution exists before our eyes, found within the very science-fiction narratives which inspired (and were in turn, inspired by) disruptive technology: be more human. To succeed in the face of uncertainty, Hamza Khan argues that we must lean into uniquely human qualities that are difficult, if not impossible, to automate. For anything that can be automated will be automated. However, that which is left will become disproportionately more valuable.

• The Great Journey: Discovering Resilience and Leadership Through Difficult Change

  Millions of years of human evolution have produced in us an instinctive aversion to change. Our default inclination in the face of hardship is to fight, fly, or freeze. Confronted by a sudden stressor, human beings experience what’s known as “the amygdala hijack”—an overriding of the part of our brain required for planning and decision making. As a preservation strategy, we avoid dealing with the problem(s) at-hand. But the things we choose not to face will face us, nonetheless.

  In this deeply personal talk, Hamza Khan makes the case that to change is human. More than that, it’s essential to long-term growth. By understanding our human nature and by intentionally contending with adversity, we can not only overcome setbacks—we can prepare ourselves to react effectively when met with future dead ends, failures, and setbacks. This talk is all about turning fear into fuel.

• Ideas into Action: Defeat Procrastination & Unlock Breakthrough Productivity

  Ideas themselves aren’t worth much—it’s the ability to execute that matters. In this dynamic session, you will receive the action-oriented insights that you didn’t get in school, highlighting real-world best practices for making ideas happen. You will be exposed to proven productivity hacks and best practices from some of the most successful and productive people on the planet. Ideas are easy, but doing stuff is hard. With the right tools and practices, you’ll be able to consistently turn your ideas into reality.