"Creativity is Everyone's Superpower." A Conversation with Wiley Author and CEO Advisor Leslie Grandy

Award-winning author, speaker, and CEO advisor Leslie Grandy guides teams, companies, and product leaders to leverage their creative thinking to elevate their organizations. She's worked across the entertainment, retail, and IT industries for the big giants whose names you'd know (including Amazon, Oracle, and Apple.) Although her book, "Creative Velocity," encourages us to harness our creativity, Leslie herself felt highly uncreative growing up. She knew she was great at other things; but creativity felt something outside of her realm, which in part inspired her book.  In our lively interview, we hear of Leslie's first published work through Wiley (2025) and how that evolved vs the popular route of self publishing. We learn of the serendipity of her careers which started in Hollywood and her leadership style which includes that enviable hybrid of kind, but firm, direct, but spacious. I enjoyed hearing of the ebbs and flow in Leslie's career and the serendipity within. Also, how she found the Sage approach and the creative approach along the way. You can find Leslie on LinkedIn and find Creative Velocity here, which will be a great read to add to our must reads by the end of the year. D G McCullough has written for the Economist, FT of London, and the Economist. She runs Hanging Rock Coaching and serves as a personal branding coach to foreign-born leaders working at Fortune 100s, including Google. Find her on LinkedIn.  Join her workshops on Maven, Brag Anyway, and Listen Like a Boss.