Dr Yemi Penn Book as a speaker/entertainer for your next event

Key Points for Dr Yemi Penn

  • Dr Yemi Penn is a globally recognised engineer, researcher, and thought leader redefining leadership through courage and curiosity.
  • Founder of Rebellious Curiosity™ and Cultural Peace Brokering™, she equips leaders to challenge inherited systems and lead meaningful transformation.
  • Awarded the Nancy Millis Medal, Yemi’s research on curiosity, trauma, and leadership ranks among Australia’s top five percent.
  • She inspires corporate, education, and government audiences to build cultures that are curious, compassionate, and collectively courageous.

Topics for Dr Yemi Penn

  • Igniting your rebellious curiosity
    We are born into an inherited narrative of what works and what doesn’t. We learn to go through life without question until something goes wrong, but even then, at times, we still stay quiet for fear of retribution, eradicating creativity, and collaboration. We learn to accept things because they are simply the way they are and have always been. This leads to people feeling unfulfilled, frustrated, and uninspired. Impacting their well-being and how they show up in life and at work. Yemi Penn will not only inspire attendees but move them to action by sharing tools and challenging attendees to start with themselves by being curious about their belief systems and challenging the status quo in the process.
  • Building a thriving culture
    We are living in fragmented times, where the very mention of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion often feels divisive. Yet beneath the tension lies a universal truth: every individual desires and has the right to belong. Through her research and lived experience, Yemi Penn reveals how our bodies carry the scars of exclusion and oppression, shaping unconscious biases in both the marginalised and the privileged. In this keynote, Yemi creates space for the uncomfortable yet necessary conversations we often avoid because they feel “too hard.” She invites leaders and teams to build cultures rooted in psychological safety, empathy, and accountability - cultures where people don’t just survive, but truly thrive. As Yemi says, “Nobody is coming to save us, so we must be bold enough to save ourselves and build thriving cultures.” This talk goes beyond inspiration - it’s a call to collective action, offering a blueprint for transforming workplaces from disconnected and transactional to deeply human and collaborative.
  • Liminal thinking
    Liminal means threshold. To solve problems, we will need to shift our perspectives and change the mindset in which these problems were created. This will require deconstruction of existing systems, requiring a bit of unreasonableness and the alchemy of bending reality. Yemi Penn will share her formula for bending reality, sharing how the boundaries that usually cage us can be used as props to bring about superior outcomes.
  • Shame and trauma resilience
    Our resilience blueprint is individual to us, meaning our specific distressing events is what creates resiliency in us, and the approach we take to get through it is what builds our blueprint. Yemi Penn is a leading thought leader on Trauma in Australia, currently undertaking a PhD researching the transformative nature of trauma. She leads individuals and organisations through their pain points using her bespoke ‘pain to power’ mapping tool to empower people through their transformation. Paving the way for greater connection within teams and kinder organisations.
  • Rebellious curiosity™ – The leadership imperative of our time
    In a world of rapid disruption, the leaders who thrive are the ones willing to ask the uncomfortable questions. In this keynote, Dr. Yemi Penn introduces her groundbreaking concept of Rebellious Curiosity™ - the courage to question norms, lean into discomfort, and transform both personal and organisational blind spots into pathways for growth. Drawing on award-winning research and lived experience, Yemi shows leaders how curiosity isn’t a nice-to-have, it’s the most radical and profitable form of leadership today.
  • Cultural peace brokering™ – How to lead through discomfort and difference
    Too often, inclusion and diversity are reduced to tick-box exercises. Dr. Yemi Penn’s Cultural Peace Brokering™ shifts the conversation from performative action to embodied solidarity. Based on her PhD research and real-world facilitation experience, this keynote gives leaders a practical roadmap to navigate collective wounds, bridge cultural divides, and build workplaces where people don’t just belong - they thrive.
  • The future of leadership is healing – Unlocking innovation through solidarity
    The old models of leadership; command, control, and compliance are breaking down. In this powerful keynote, Dr. Yemi Penn argues that the future belongs to healing leaders: those who make peace with discomfort, honour diverse voices, and create cultures of psychological safety and growth. Backed by her award-winning doctoral research, Yemi makes the case that healing isn’t soft - it’s the missing link between resilience, innovation, and sustainable impact.
  • Building Courage and resilience
    Our resilience blueprint is individual to us, meaning our specific distressing events is what creates resiliency in us. This can be hard to see or understand because life can be demanding, making it difficult to understand what our primary needs are and the driving force(s) that limits our ability to be fully courageous. Yemi shares her bespoke pain to power mapping tool to uncover our resilience blueprint. Sharing research, tools and approaches to building our resilience especially during times of uncertainty.

Testimonials for Dr Yemi Penn

Dr. Penn delivered an empowering and deeply resonant keynote that challenged attendees to tap into their ‘rebellious curiosity’ to drive personal and professional transformation. With authenticity, humor, and vulnerability, she invited nurses to reframe their thinking, dismantle limiting beliefs, and lead change, starting from within.
Virginia Nurses

I just wanted to take the time to write back to say thank you for this session. Yemi is an incredible speaker and the session far exceeded my expectations! I’ve been involved in other mentoring programs before and they didn’t have something quite like this / to this quality before.
Transgrid

Yemi has a magical ability to connect with large audiences, bring them on a journey of self-discovery, whilst embracing their own vulnerability. Yemi is an unexpected powerhouse of emotions and inspiration. She engaged our audience through challenging questions, difficult conversation, and well-timed humour. Yemi is wonderful to work with, bringing her whole self to each engagement, deeply understanding your purpose and where you want to take your audience. I would recommend Yemi to be your next keynote or MC with no hesitation.
Lead Content Curator
The Outside (PwC)

Yemi facilitated an extremely complex and challenging symposium over 2 days of multiple sessions with several stakeholders to help us achieve concrete outcomes and action plans that we wanted. It was an immense task and Yemi was beyond excellent in keeping people engaged, active and in good humour to work collaboratively and effectively
Associate Professor and Director, Women in Engineering and IT
University Technology Sydney

Yemi was very personable, sharing from her own experience built immediate rapport. Personally I was very impressed that Yemi was in the room prior to her session. This became evident in her presentation when she referred to topics that previous speakers had discussed, making her key points more relevant to the audience.
Hammond Care