Seth Godin: A Can’t Miss Keynote at ATD25

When ATD announced that Seth Godin would be a keynote speaker at the ATD 2019 International Conference & EXPO, I remember shouting with joy from my office at ATD HQ. I’ve been a fan of Seth Godin for decades.

While no longer an ATD team member, I’m thrilled to know he’ll be speaking at ATD25, and I’d encourage every attendee to create a schedule that allows them to learn from this teacher, author, entrepreneur, and serial disruptor. Your thinking and idea-generating will improve after listening to him.

I was first introduced to Seth—as many are—through his blog. His commitment to daily writing is in and of itself inspiring, and what he writes about rises above the noise of much of what passes for content on the internet these days.

ATD’s put Seth’s work in front of its global audience for years—his blog was featured in a 2012 TD magazine article. He is a true champion of learning, creativity, and the spread of ideas.

When the global pandemic changed everything about conferences, Seth agreed to be a keynote speaker for the ATD Virtual Conference: Unleash Potential.

Before that event, he provided an interview that I recently revisited. It reminded me, once again, why Seth Godin is such a relevant thought leader for the L&D tribe. Here’s a little snippet of that interview:

Why is creativity important for TD professionals to harness?

Not only do we need to hire for and develop creativity in others, but we need to dig deep to find it in ourselves. That’s because the best practices don’t exist yet—we have to create them. Our organizations need leadership, not simply management, and it’s up to each of us to model that and teach it. It begins with us realizing that attitudes are skills and that leadership is not the same as management.

What is one action TD professionals can take right now to unleash potential?

That’s it: Ask. Ask why. Ask how you can contribute something more than effort and ask why you haven’t. Ask what if. What if we did it differently? We can’t train our way out of this situation. Our only hope is to develop our way forward instead.

I’m excited to see what fresh perspectives Seth will bring to the ATD25 audience. I’m sure it will be a memorable talk.