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    Victor Perton

    Helping people become more optimistic and leaders more infectious in their optimism

    Victor Perton: Optimism People can Feel and Put to Work

    Victor’s engaging keynotes, workshops and conversations give people practical ways to strengthen their optimism, leadership and belief that progress is possible.

    Victor Perton is the Founder and Chief Optimism Officer of The Centre for Optimism, one of the world’s foremost advocates for fostering optimism and one of Australia’s leading voices on infectiously optimistic leadership.

    Invite Victor to speak
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    What will Victor bring to your audience?

    Victor creates engaging and highly participatory experiences that lift people’s spirits, strengthen their belief that progress is possible and inspire practical action.

    Participants discover ways to:

    • become more optimistic
    • foster optimism in others
    • lead with realistic and infectious optimism
    • ask better questions and create better conversations
    • strengthen resilience, creativity and collaboration
    • see possibility in times of difficulty and change
    • take the next wise step

    Victor’s ultimate challenge is to aim for magnetic optimism: optimism so tangible and a vision so compelling that people want to reach out and touch it.

    Optimism people experience

    Victor creates moments in which people do more than hear about optimism. They experience it together.

    At the Australasian Renal Conference, he asked hundreds of people to share the best thing in their day with the person beside them. As Victor stood alone on stage, the joy of their conversations flowed towards him like a tidal wave. One good question had connected and energised the room.

    Victor has brought similarly participatory and practical experiences to audiences around the world, including World Commerce & Contracting conferences in Phoenix, Madrid and Sydney, the British Civil Service during COVID-19, CSL, Nepalese bankers, universities and schools, and Rotary and Probus clubs.

    More recently, an online masterclass on optimistic leadership for the Australian Public Service attracted a record of more than 1,000 enrolments.

    After a workshop with Animal-Free Science Advocacy, the organisation said Victor’s session renewed the team’s “spirit, perspective and courage”. The idea of quiet optimism strengthened its members’ belief that progress is possible, even when meaningful change is difficult and slow.

    From senior leaders and public servants to students and community groups, Victor’s purpose remains the same: to help people become more optimistic, foster optimism in others and leave ready to take the next wise step.

    Keynotes, workshops and conversations

    Victor tailors every presentation to the audience, its opportunities and the challenges it faces.

    Popular themes include:

    • Infectiously Optimistic Leadership
    • Magnetic Optimism
    • Optimism: The How and Why
    • The Habits of an Optimist
    • Quiet Optimism for Difficult and Long-Term Change
    • Optimism, Innovation and Transformation
    • Asking Better Questions
    • Optimistic Leadership in Public Service
    • Optimism, Social Cohesion and Peacebuilding

    Victor is available for keynote presentations, interactive workshops, leadership conversations, conference facilitation, panel chairing and media interviews.

    Invite Victor to speak
    Plan an optimism workshop

    More About Victor

    Victor’s life and work have taken him from the courtroom and parliament to diplomacy, public policy, boardrooms, classrooms and communities around the world.

    A former Victorian parliamentarian and barrister, Victor served as Victoria’s Commissioner to the Americas and as a senior adviser to the Australian Treasury during Australia’s G20 presidency. He now teaches public policy through the Australian Public Service Academy, serves as an Ambassador for Intelligent Water Networks and leads the research and outreach of The Centre for Optimism.

    Victor is the author of Optimism: The How and Why and the founder of The Australian Leadership Project. His research explores what makes people optimistic and how leaders can foster optimism, strengthen action and help people believe that progress is possible.

    The Australian Financial Review has described Victor as “our optimist in chief” and an “optimism guru”.

    Victor Perton and Lisa Leong on "The Secret to Optimism"

    Screenshot 2023-11-23 at 5.27.15 pm

     

    The Centre for Optimism

    The Centre for Optimism is a Think-Tank dedicated to asking people "What makes you Optimistic?" and fostering the realistic and infectious optimism the world needs in the 2020s.

    In a passionate address entitled, “Creating Bases for Optimism in an Era of Insecurities”, Singapore’s senior Minister Tharman Shanmugaratnam noted, "We have entered an era without precedent, certainly not in living memory, and it has led to a loss of optimism almost across the world."  

    Fear and intolerance are undermining our democracies:  The  World Economic Forum included the loss of global optimism in its global risk register for 2022. The World Happiness Report 2022  picked up a shortage of global optimism.   McKinsey & Company and Rabobank Australia picked up the same trends for Australia - falling optimism in a country with a stereotype of relentless optimism.

    The Centre for Optimism was born out of the research of The Australian Leadership Project which studied Australian leadership and its qualities and the inexplicable negativity of contemporary Australian attitudes to leadership.

    Andy Reid, Success Coach

    "Victor Perton is so bloody engaging... must be that optimism of his."

     

    Gratitude JournalTogether with Victor, Project Optimism has produced "The Optimist's Gratitude Journal: 100 days to share and develop your gratitude" which is very helpful.

    See https://www.amazon.com/Optimists-Gratitude-Journal-develop-gratitude/dp/B09MC5ZNPX

     

     

     

    Connect With Us

    We love to connect with everyone who is ready to open up and share their optimisim.