Gregg Vanourek

Gregg’s Bio:

Gregg Vanourek helps people with personal development and leadership through his books, courses, workshops, and speaking. He’s worked at market-leading ventures across industries and sectors.

He runs Gregg Vanourek LLC (a training and development venture) and teaches leadership at Stockholm Business School in its Executive MBA program. He also offers his the Crafting Your Life & Work online course to help you find happiness, success, and fulfillment doing what you love. Gregg was a tech startup executive at K12 Inc. (now a market leader with $1 billion in sales) and co-founded New Mountain Ventures (developing entrepreneurial leaders).

Gregg is co-author of three influential books, including LIFE Entrepreneurs: Ordinary People Creating Extraordinary Lives (a clarion call for infusing our life with passion and purpose) and Triple Crown Leadership: Building Excellent, Ethical, and Enduring Organizations (a winner of the International Book Awards). His books, workshops, and talks are appreciated by thousands of people worldwide, many of whom have reinvented their life and work with Gregg’s tools as a guide. His writing has appeared in or been reviewed by Bloomberg Businessweek, Entrepreneur, Fast Company, Harvard Business Review, Inc., Leader to Leader, New York Times, Publishers Weekly, U.S. News & World Report, Washington Post, Washington Times, CNBC.com, ColoradoBiz, Leaderonomics, People & Strategy, TLNT.com, and more publications.

Gregg has given talks and workshops in many countries. His TEDx talk is a call to focus on discovering who we are and what we value most.

Having lived and worked in the U.S. and Europe, Gregg was Vice Director of the Entrepreneurship and Innovation Management Program at KTH-Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm, and Vice Center Director for the award-winning Stockholm School of Entrepreneurship at KTH. He served as Chairman of the Board of SE Forum (a global social entrepreneurship accelerator) in Stockholm. He also taught leadership at the University of Denver.

He has taught thousands of students over more than a decade at different universities in Stockholm and Denver in executive and master’s courses. Gregg was a senior vice president at the Thomas B. Fordham Foundation (which he helped to launch), research fellow at the Hudson Institute (think tank), and board member of the Vail Alliance and the Vail Leadership Institute.

Gregg is the Community Leadership Fellow & Program Advisor for Leadership Jeffco and serves on the board of the Swedish-American Chamber of Commerce in Colorado. He also volunteers at McLain Community High School.

Gregg graduated from the Yale School of Management (M.B.A.), London School of Economics and Political Science (M.Sc.), and Claremont McKenna College (B.A., magna cum laude), where he was an Academic All American soccer player.

He lives near Denver, Colorado with his wife, daughters, dogs, and cats.

Gregg’s Books:

• LIFE Entrepreneurs: Ordinary People Creating Extraordinary Lives is a clarion call for living with purpose and passion. It tells the stories of people who have reinvented themselves and infused their life and work with passion and fulfillment. The book draws on interviews with 55 remarkable people. Co-author: Christopher Gergen, a dynamic social entrepreneur (and friend).

• Triple Crown Leadership: Building Excellent, Ethical, and Enduring Organizations champions a better brand of leadership. It draws upon our own experience, research, and interviews with leaders in 61 organizations in 11 countries. This book was a winner of the International Book Awards and has been called “the best book on leadership since Good to Great.” Co-author: Bob Vanourek (my father and a former corporate and turnaround CEO).

• Charter Schools in Action: Renewing Public Education is an authoritative, comprehensive explanation and appraisal of the charter public school phenomenon, based on site visits to 100 schools, interviews with hundreds of administrators, and surveys of thousands of students, parents, and teachers. Co-authors: Chester E. Finn, Jr. and Bruno V. Manno.

Gregg’s Top Blogs on Personal Development:

• The Trap of a Victim Mentality–And What to Do About It
• Self-Deception–Why We Do It and How to Stop It
• The Benefits of Nature and Getting Outside
• The Power of Taking Full Responsibility for Your Life
• Why We Want Adventure in Our Lives–And How to Get It

Gregg’s Top Blogs on Leadership:

• Ethical Decision-Making: Simple Tests
• Why David Gergen’s Legacy Matters Now More than Ever
• 3 Things Ethical Leaders Ask and Say
• Why Leaders Should Create a Culture of Stewardship
• The Four Types of People in Any Organization (Beware the Fourth)