Bold, future-focused leadership for a changing world
KEYNOTE SPEAKING · AVRIL HENRY AM
Avril brings a rare combination of commercial acumen, emotional intelligence, and lived experience. Her keynotes are inspiring, practical, often humorous and deeply human.
Signature keynotes
Avril Henry is one of Australia’s most influential voices on modern leadership, culture transformation, and human-centred workplaces. Known for her candour, courage, and evidence-based insights, Avril equips leaders and organisations to thrive in environments defined by uncertainty, disruption, and rapid change.
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A provocative look at how leaders can turn generational tension into collaboration, performance, and cultural strength. Avril reveals the strengths of every generation, dismantles stereotypes, and how to build workplaces where collaboration thrives. Audiences learn practical strategies to engage, and retain different generations, creating cultures that are inclusive, high-performing, and thriving.
Focus: Leadership, communication, inclusion.
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A bold challenge to outdated leadership models, revealing the courage, agility, and mindset required to stay ahead in a future that refuses to slow down. This session explores the forces reshaping work and the leadership capabilities needed to navigate constant change and drive performance into an unpredictable future.
Focus: Change, agility, leadership mindset.
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Avril delivers a powerful, evidence-based case for DEI as a competitive advantage, showing how belonging drives innovation, trust, and organisational performance. She provides practical tools to shift behaviour, reduce bias, and create workplaces where people feel valued, respected, and able to contribute fully.
Focus: Psychological safety, behaviour change, inclusive leadership.
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A compelling call to personal accountability, clarity, and courage, demonstrating how self-leadership transforms influence, confidence, and impact. Avril empowers audiences to lead themselves with emotional intelligence, and purpose to create positive impact at work and beyond.
Focus: Self-awareness, mindset, ownership.
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This is the emotional load of leadership and Avril shows you how to lead sustainably without burning out. Before a leader can influence others or shape a team, they must first master their own behaviour, mindset, and emotional discipline. Leading Me builds the foundation of self-awareness, accountability, and purpose. Leading You is where leaders learn to connect, communicate, and elevate individuals with empathy and intention. Leading Them is the culmination: leading teams and organisations with courage, trust, and cultural intelligence. This forms a leadership model that is human-centred, future-focused, and essential in a world defined by complexity, disruption, and rapid change.
Focus: Leadership, communication, change.
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Trust is the currency of performance, and it’s in short supply. Avril shows leaders how to rebuild trust, strengthen communication, and create psychological safety in workplaces strained by hybrid work, burnout, and organisational change. Participants learn how to break down silos, collaborate with purpose, challenge respectfully, and create cultures where people feel they belong, and where exceptional results follow naturally.
Focus: Performance, culture, leadership.
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The leaders who thrive today aren’t the toughest, they’re the most emotionally intelligent and adaptable. This is a bold exploration of EQ, resilience, and adaptability as the defining leadership capabilities of the modern era. Avril equips leaders with practical strategies to stay grounded under pressure, navigate uncertainty, and lead with empathy, strength, compassion, and clarity in environments that demand constant reinvention.
Focus: EQ, resilience, adaptability and change.
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AI is transforming work, but it cannot replace what makes leadership human. Avril explores the irreplaceable power of empathy, trust, emotional intelligence, and authentic communication in an AI-driven world. Audiences learn how to balance technology with humanity, strengthen relationships, and build resilient teams and cultures where people feel connected, supported, and inspired to contribute. This is the leadership advantage machines will never replicate.
Focus: The future of work, AI, humanity, communication.
A PERSONAL KEYNOTE
Cancer: The Gift in the Fight
“I chose not to be a victim or a survivor; I chose to be a warrior.”
Cancer changes everything, including who you become. Avril shares her deeply personal three year journey through breast cancer: the surgeries, the stillness, the fear, the recovery, and the decision not to ask: “Why me?” but “Why not me?” In a world where one in four women over 60 in Australia face breast cancer, Avril’s story is a powerful reminder that adversity can reveal strength, compassion, and purpose we never knew we had. She chose not to be a victim or a survivor, but a warrior — emerging stronger, kinder, and more grounded. She fought cancer and came back a better person.
This keynote is profoundly inspiring for International Women’s Day, and any event focused on courage, resilience, and the power of choosing who you become.
Booking Avril
Avril takes bookings across Australia and internationally. Travel is negotiated separately. When you enquire, include the date, the audience, and location.
Not-for-profit organisations and women running their own businesses: mention your context and rates can be discussed.
Why organisers choose Avril
650+
KEYNOTES DELIVERED
400+
WORKSHOPS DELIVERED
200,000+
PEOPLE IN THE ROOM
“An excellent choice to provide the closing session. She brought a level of passion and energy that kept attendees engaged until the end.”
“[Avril is a] fluent, captivating and authoritative presenter. A five-star performance; the highlight of the Congress. ”
Named one of the AFR Westpac 100 Women of Influence, and top 10 Diversity practitioners in 2015.
Winner of the HR Lifetime Achievement Award in 2006 at the National HR Awards.
Winner of the Coaching Leadership Award at the Global HR Excellence Awards in 2012.
Made a Member of the Order of Australia in 2024. Global Woman of Influence 2025 Winner.
CLIENTS INCLUDE
IBM · BHP · ANZ · WESTPAC · NAB · CBA · LEIGHTONS CONSTRUCTION · AUSTRALIAN TAX OFFICE · LOCAL GOVERNMENT COUNCILS · STATE HEALTH SERVICES · AUSTRALIAN DEFENCE · EMERGENCY SERVICES · CPA AUSTRALIA · PROFESSIONAL SERVICES ORGANISATIONS · MAJOR UNIVERSITIES · THE PROPERTY COUNCIL OF AUSTRALIA · THE GLOBAL WOMEN'S SUMMIT · GOVERNMENT DEPARTMENTS ACROSS SINGAPORE AND HONG KONG