Ori Brafman is a multiple New York Times bestselling author. He specializes in organizational culture, leadership, inclusion, and conflict resolution.
Brafman’s recent bestselling book, Radical Inclusion: What the Post– 9/11 World Should Have Taught Us About Leadership, co-authored with 18th Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Martin Dempsey, argues that inclusion is no longer a “nice-to-have”, but a strategic imperative in today’s rapidly changing world. His seminal work, The Starfish and the Spider: The Unstoppable Power of Leaderless Organizations, is cited by the U.S. military as the foundation for a successful campaign to counter Al Qaeda. Its concepts, including distributed networks and decentralization, have been utilized by Amazon, Google, Netflix, Facebook, Cisco Systems, Gartner, the Johnson & Johnson Companies, Optum, Toyota, Greenpeace, C2FO, and the Family Business Network, among others, and formed the basis of blockchain technologies.
Brafman has advised Fortune 500 companies, all branches of the U.S. military, the Obama White House, the Association for Financial Professionals, the National Academy of Sciences, NASA, and NATO, among others. His media appearances include the New York Times, the Washington Post, Bloomberg TV, CBS, Fox News, MSNBC, ABC News, BBC, National Public Radio, CNBC, the Wall Street Journal, CNN, and C-SPAN. His published books include Radical Inclusion: What the Post-9/11 World Should Have Taught Us About Leadership; The Starfish and the Spider: The Unstoppable Power of Leaderless Organizations; Sway: The Irresistible Pull of Irrational Behavior; Click: The Forces Behind How We Fully Engage with People, Work, and Everything We Do; and The Chaos Imperative: How Chance and Disruption Increase Innovation, Effectiveness, and Success.
Brafman is a Distinguished Teaching Fellow at UC Berkeley’s Haas School of Business where he lectures on leadership and the ethical use of technology. He leads a strategic broadening seminar between UC Berkeley and the U.S. Army and created a first-of-its-kind partnership between the Haas School of Business and the U.S. military’s National Defense University.
Brafman is founder of Starfish Leadership and co-founder of the Fully Charged Institute, which combines his work with that of Tom Rath. Brafman is co-founder of Vegan Action (vegan.org) which celebrated its 25th anniversary in 2019. His current advisory roles include Military Mentors, the Starfish Mission – Blockchain, and Vegan Action. Amongst his proudest accomplishments is having been a contestant on The Price is Right where he won a brand new Ford Mustang convertible.
Brafman holds a BA in Peace and Conflict from UC Berkeley and an MBA from Stanford Graduate School of Business.
