Member since September 2025
Lauren Ducrey spent seven years designing the personalities of the Google Assistant and Gemini, only to uncover a surprising truth: in an AI-powered world, the leaders who thrive aren’t the most technical—they’re the most emotionally intelligent. As an award-winning poet and AI consultant, she now partners with global companies to transform how teams lead, connect, and communicate—using generative AI and poetic thinking to unlock creative resilience and cultural change.
Lauren has headlined international conferences including Adopt AI (Europe’s largest AI conference), Summit at Sea, and Human + Tech, led sessions for corporate leaders at AXA, PepsiCo, Renault, and Squarespace, and inspired students at universities like Columbia University. She reframes generative AI as a tool for human growth, leaving audiences with practical insight and emotional clarity to lead in a changing world. Featured by Bloomberg, The Huffington Post and Le Monde, Lauren brings both poetic firepower and tech fluency to every stage.
“This one session reminded me that our company culture - Googleyness - is still alive and well.”
A leader told me this after a session of the Poetry for Wellbeing Program that I founded during COVID for high-achieving Googlers to stay connected with their purpose at work thru times of deep uncertainty. I smiled as wide as her eyes because I’d seen it happen again and again: the way a single poem could crack open a room, and remind a team who they are when everything around them is changing, in under a single hour.
My cheeks have been cramping with smiles every time a team leader tells me, “we were able to dive into strategic conversations so much faster after crafting our team’s poetic manifesto,” or an audience member shares, “a year later, the only talk I remember from the conference is the poem you performed—how it stilled the room into presence and brought tears to our eyes.”
Because poetry is the shortest bridge between our mind and our emotions, it's the most powerful language we have to express, and connect in ways that no slide deck or strategy memo ever could.
He took the mic and said, “This is my worst nightmare.”
A room of 130 high-achieving tech employees had been writing about their purpose at work in poem form, using a bespoke AI tool I created. It was time to share when this one employee confessed his discomfort. I swallowed audibly and smiled, hoping to soften the moment.
And then it happened.
He read his poem—about how his speech impediment had made public speaking nothing short of torture for most of his life. How, when he’d interviewed to join his team, he’d worried about how they might judge him. How he’d been met with kindness, warmth, and acceptance. How, in this moment, he was sharing a poem out loud, at work.
The room went dead silent. Then applause erupted. Hands shot up—people suddenly more eager than ever to share their own poems of purpose. A room of hardworking, analytical strategists turned into a room of candid, engaged collaborators. In under an hour, poetry was the key to unlocking the courage that builds cultures of trust, not just teams of performers.
I became a poet in tech by accident.
It’s 2017. I’m wrapping up a job in public education in New York City when a message from Google lands in my LinkedIn inbox. I blink at it twice. You need a writer? For… AI? A few interviews later, I’m suddenly helping shape the voice of Google Assistant—teaching machines how to speak human.
Then large language models arrive, and everything shifts. The entire field of AI begins to be built from words—the same raw material poets have been sculpting for millennia. I start to see it in real time: how tone changes trust, how a single phrase can soften resistance or spark anxiety, how emotional undertones quietly make or break a product. It becomes obvious—understanding language is no longer a “nice to have.” It’s a core design decision, with real consequences for human flourishing.
That’s when it clicks. Poetry isn’t my side path. It’s the skill that lets me fuse emotional intelligence with technological intelligence—the missing layer in how we build, lead, and communicate in an AI-shaped world.
From there, the work expands. I move from tech teams to executive offsites to conference stages, helping leaders use language not just to inform, but to transform. Whether I’m guiding a team to craft a poetic manifesto or helping a room of engineers articulate their purpose, the pattern repeats itself: clarity rises, connection deepens, and people begin to lead from a more human center.
It turns out being a poet in tech wasn't accidental.
It was inevitable.
We often talk about culture. This session lets you feel it—and write it—live. In this interactive keynote, Lauren Ducrey invites attendees to discover their personal value through metaphor, then co-create a poetic manifesto that captures the voice of the room, with the help of AI as a creative collaborator. Blending reflection, inspiration and collective storytelling, this session delivers an unexpected, meaningful and deeply energizing moment of connection. Ideal as an opening, breakout or closing session.
Attendee results:
Discover how metaphor sharpens leadership clarity and emotional intelligence in an AI world.
Identify your unique leadership signature through a guided metaphor discovery exercise.
Experience AI as a creative partner that amplifies human imagination and insight.
Co-create a poetic manifesto that captures the room’s shared voice and values.
We’re constantly told to keep up with the latest AI tools, but what if your most powerful edge as a leader isn’t technical at all? This keynote reframes AI as a catalyst for emotional intelligence, showing how tools like ChatGPT or Gemini can sharpen your communication skills, deepen your empathy, and enhance your leadership presence. Drawing from real-world use cases and research in psychology, the session blends poetic performance with strategic storytelling to offer a new lens on human-centered leadership in the AI era. You’ll leave not only with tools to lead more effectively, but with a renewed sense of confidence in your irreplaceable human value.
Attendee results:
Reframe AI as a tool that enhances—not replaces—your human advantage
Recognize emotional intelligence as a measurable driver of your career success
Learn how to treat empathy and communication as core leadership skills
Practical tips on how to use AI to roleplay difficult conversations and build your EQ
Leave with renewed confidence in your unique value as a leader
He took the mic and said, “This is my worst nightmare.”
A room of 130 high-achieving tech employees had been writing about their purpose at work in poem form, using a bespoke AI tool I created. It was time to share when this one employee confessed his discomfort. I swallowed audibly and smiled, hoping to soften the moment.
And then it happened.
He read his poem—about how his speech impediment had made public speaking nothing short of torture for most of his life. How, when he’d interviewed to join his team, he’d worried about how they might judge him. How he’d been met with kindness, warmth, and acceptance. How, in this moment, he was sharing a poem out loud, at work.
The room went dead silent. Then applause erupted. Hands shot up—people suddenly more eager than ever to share their own poems of purpose. A room of hardworking, analytical strategists turned into a room of candid, engaged collaborators. In under an hour, poetry was the key to unlocking the courage that builds cultures of trust, not just teams of performers.
I became a poet in tech by accident.
It’s 2017. I’m wrapping up a job in public education in New York City when a message from Google lands in my LinkedIn inbox. I blink at it twice. You need a writer? For… AI? A few interviews later, I’m suddenly helping shape the voice of Google Assistant—teaching machines how to speak human.
Then large language models arrive, and everything shifts. The entire field of AI begins to be built from words—the same raw material poets have been sculpting for millennia. I start to see it in real time: how tone changes trust, how a single phrase can soften resistance or spark anxiety, how emotional undertones quietly make or break a product. It becomes obvious—understanding language is no longer a “nice to have.” It’s a core design decision, with real consequences for human flourishing.
That’s when it clicks. Poetry isn’t my side path. It’s the skill that lets me fuse emotional intelligence with technological intelligence—the missing layer in how we build, lead, and communicate in an AI-shaped world.
From there, the work expands. I move from tech teams to executive offsites to conference stages, helping leaders use language not just to inform, but to transform. Whether I’m guiding a team to craft a poetic manifesto or helping a room of engineers articulate their purpose, the pattern repeats itself: clarity rises, connection deepens, and people begin to lead from a more human center.
It turns out being a poet in tech wasn't accidental.
It was inevitable.
We often talk about culture. This session lets you feel it—and write it—live. In this interactive keynote, Lauren Ducrey invites attendees to discover their personal value through metaphor, then co-create a poetic manifesto that captures the voice of the room, with the help of AI as a creative collaborator. Blending reflection, inspiration and collective storytelling, this session delivers an unexpected, meaningful and deeply energizing moment of connection. Ideal as an opening, breakout or closing session.
Attendee results:
Discover how metaphor sharpens leadership clarity and emotional intelligence in an AI world.
Identify your unique leadership signature through a guided metaphor discovery exercise.
Experience AI as a creative partner that amplifies human imagination and insight.
Co-create a poetic manifesto that captures the room’s shared voice and values.
We’re constantly told to keep up with the latest AI tools, but what if your most powerful edge as a leader isn’t technical at all? This keynote reframes AI as a catalyst for emotional intelligence, showing how tools like ChatGPT or Gemini can sharpen your communication skills, deepen your empathy, and enhance your leadership presence. Drawing from real-world use cases and research in psychology, the session blends poetic performance with strategic storytelling to offer a new lens on human-centered leadership in the AI era. You’ll leave not only with tools to lead more effectively, but with a renewed sense of confidence in your irreplaceable human value.
Attendee results:
Reframe AI as a tool that enhances—not replaces—your human advantage
Recognize emotional intelligence as a measurable driver of your career success
Learn how to treat empathy and communication as core leadership skills
Practical tips on how to use AI to roleplay difficult conversations and build your EQ
Leave with renewed confidence in your unique value as a leader