PROFILE
A soldier, scholar, skydiver, author, executive coach and much-honored leadership thought leader, General Tom Kolditz’s celebrated career in the military, higher education and business consulting has been driven by a singular mission: Helping people from all walks of life become better leaders, ready for crisis, adversity and extreme conditions.
A recipient of the Distinguished Service Medal, the Army’s highest award for service, General Kolditz was also named a Top Leadership Thought Leader by the Leader to Leader Institute and received the prestigious Warren Bennis Award for Excellence in Leadership, an honor shared with George Schultz, Benazir Bhutto and Doris Kearns Goodwin. He is also ranked #13/30 in coaching by Global Gurus and was ranked in the top eight globally by Thinkers50, the premier global ranking among management thinkers.
Tom Kolditz is one of the most experienced and educated leadership experts of our time. An intellectually gifted scholar, he holds a BA from Vanderbilt University, three master’s degrees, a PhD in psychology from the University of Missouri, and an honorary Doctorate from the Chicago School of Professional Psychology. He taught at West Point, Yale University, and Rice University for 22 years. He is a widely published author of two books and more than 75 journal articles, and is a Fellow of the American Psychological Association. Yet unlike most academics, he is also a profoundly experienced leader.
He has been the principal responsible for 12 organizations, both military and civilian, over 35 years leading people across four continents. A retired Brigadier General, he commanded thousands of troops, served in combat, and was awarded the Army’s highest medal for service.
He is the successful founder of five leader development start-ups, including the Ann John Doerr Institute for New Leaders. In 2017, he was honored with the prestigious Warren Bennis Award for Excellence in Leadership—an honor also bestowed on other brilliant scholars like Doris Kearns Goodwin and Tom Peters, and other outstanding leaders like Howard Schultz and Benazir Bhutto. He is the author of In Extremis Leadership: Leading As If Your Life Depended On It, an authoritative book based on more than 175 interviews taken on the ground in Iraq during combat operations. His latest book, Against the Storm: How True Leaders Prevail When the World Shakes (Wiley, September 2026) offers a practical, experience-driven framework for how leaders can build trust, make high-stakes decisions, and guide people through extreme uncertainty, crisis, and potential chaos.
Tom now focuses on developing others. He has spoken to more than 350 audiences worldwide and is a highly sought-after professional leadership coach, ranked multiple times among the top 15 coaches internationally by both Global Gurus London and Thinkers50, most recently, #3 in the 2025 Coaching Legends.
SPEAKING TOPICS
In Extremis Leadership: Leading As If Your Life Depended On It
Operating environments for both government and business are characterized by volatility, complexity, and uncertainty—perfect conditions for crises to emerge. Brigadier Gen. Tom Kolditz, author of In Extremis Leadership: Leading as if Your Life Depended on It, shows how extreme life-and-death situations can offer profound lessons for leaders in any setting. Tom’s research reveals that the leadership skills and principles evident in dangerous settings also apply to leading in business and everyday life, making this program applicable to both personal and professional success.
Hope Is not a Method: 40 years of Leadership Takeaways
Too often, leaders hope for success without using specific techniques for leading effectively. After leading dozens of organizations on 4 continents, and teaching leaders and leadership for 25 years, Tom distills eight proven techniques he uses regularly to get the job done as a leader. This presentation is extremely pragmatic and will allow for immediate application in peoples’ professional and personal lives.
Leaders Developing Leaders
One of a leader’s most powerful legacies is developing the leaders who follow them. Leadership development programs in business are often focused on talent managers and HR directors. Brigadier Gen. Tom Kolditz illustrates how, in an evidence-based way, each leader can personally and directly develop their people, increasing the performance and retention of employees and building a solid foundation for the future. Tapping leadership development principles used at West Point, the Yale School of Management, and other high-performing organizations, Tom’s presentation creates a clear path and practical framework for leaders to have greater impact and influence over their people while simultaneously helping them achieve their potential.
Dodging Bullets: How to Prepare Your Organization for the Next Crisis
Few people want to be put into a position of being crisis managers. So how can leaders prepare organizations to avoid crises before they occur? In this engaging talk, Brigadier Gen. Tom Kolditz will take the audience through specific processes and techniques to help leadership anticipate and prevent crises and have a more effective, more empowered workforce every day.
