Keynotes & Workshops
Built for the stage.
Made for Monday.
Risk, innovation, and AI adoption, taught through an investor's lens.
Inspiration fades by Monday. An action plan doesn't. Antonia takes audiences past motivation and hands them real frameworks to put into action with their teams right away.
Signature Keynotes
Keynote 01
Leading When the Ground Is Moving
For leaders steering teams through industry disruption
Teams don't stall because change is hard. They stall because nobody's told them what's safe to risk while everything around them is shifting.
This talk gives leaders a simple way to agree with their teams on what's off-limits, decide in advance what "ready" looks like, and keep making smart bets while the bigger picture is still unsettled.
Audience Takeaways
- Apply the Risk Zones Method™ to map the space between safe and reckless for their team's real decisions
- Set clear boundaries with their team on what's off-limits, so people stop guessing and start moving
- Define what "ready" looks like before a decision, so the team acts on a standard it agreed to, not a feeling
Keynote 02
Capturing the Upside of Uncertainty
For teams building deals, partnerships, and new markets
The best opportunities show up before the data does, and investors have a system for deciding which ones to back.
Drawing on a decade of investing in early-stage companies and venture funds, Antonia teaches teams to size up partners, deals, and new markets like an investor. They learn to weigh the upside, price the risk, and know which terms they'll walk away from.
Audience Takeaways
- Use the Risk Zones Method™ to decide which opportunities to pursue before the data is complete
- Run the due diligence questions investors ask before backing a deal, partner, or new market
- Put a number on the cost of waiting, so inaction gets judged like any other decision
Keynote 03
AI: Scapegoat or Strategy?
For HR, people, & executive leaders
AI isn't your scapegoat, and it isn't your strategy. Your leadership is.
This interactive keynote gives leaders a method to decide whether AI belongs in their organization, and exactly where. Through live written exercises, Antonia applies The Risk Zones Method™, the same process she uses to underwrite high-risk investments, to real workforce decisions.
Audience Takeaways
- Identify the three priorities on their own strategy list where AI fits best, and why the most critical ones aren't where to start
- Make AI workforce decisions with clear criteria, the way an investor weighs a high-risk bet, instead of reacting to hype or fear
- Explain those decisions to their people, so AI doesn't become the excuse for cuts or for standing still
Keynote 04
AI as the Intern
For teams ready to put AI to work
Most AI rollouts fail for the same reason bad internships do. Unclear assignments, insufficient training, and inadequate oversight.
After this keynote, teams leave knowing how to pick AI's first assignments, the problems valuable enough to matter, but not so critical that a misstep is costly. They also set the guardrails, training, and success measures that turn AI into a real contributor.
Audience Takeaways
- Scope a first AI assignment with a clear owner, a defined task, and a measure of success before buying any tool
- Give every AI tool a human manager who reviews its work, so mistakes get caught before they reach a customer
- Vet AI vendors the way an investor vets a startup: the team, the evidence, and the terms
Keynote 05
Permission to Fail
For leaders building teams that innovate
Most organizations give their teams permission to try. Very few give them permission to fail, and nothing new gets built without it.
As a venture investor, Antonia works in the highest-risk asset class there is, where failure is priced in. She once ran upstart brands inside a global conglomerate, on a lean team that became the company's sandbox. This keynote shows leaders how to build that kind of team on purpose.
Audience Takeaways
- Budget for failure the way investors do, so a missed bet is expected instead of punished
- Set up a small, protected team that tests new ideas without putting the core business at risk
- Run reviews after an experiment fails that capture the lesson instead of assigning blame
Keynote 06
The Beauty of Risk Taking
For general audiences navigating a pivot
Career growth is on the other side of the scary move.
This keynote walks audiences through the real calculus behind a career pivot, breaking down how to tell the difference between a risk worth taking and one to walk away from, how to build the confidence to move before you feel fully ready, and why the cost of standing still is almost always higher than it looks.
Audience Takeaways
- Apply the Risk Zones Method™ to weigh their next career move against what staying put is really costing them
- Advocate for themselves through a transition, with a clear story about where they're headed and why
- Take a first step before they feel fully ready, with a backup plan if it doesn't work out
Go deeperAll keynotes are also available as half-day or full-day workshops, where leadership teams apply the frameworks to their own decisions, data, and people.
Book a WorkshopTrusted By
