Dr. Vanessa Akhtar has a background in Counseling Psychology, specializing in Sport & Performance Psychology. Before transitioning into the consulting world, she taught at Boston University and worked with teams, coaches and athletes – ranging from youth through to professional and Olympic-level – to help individuals reach the top of their game. She has worked with organizations around the globe, spanning a variety of industries – including healthcare, education, oil and energy, pharmaceuticals, non-profits, advertising and philanthropic foundations. Her ultimate goal is to help individuals and groups develop critical leadership skills, across all levels of organizations, to better meet the changing needs of today’s complex environment. At Kotter, Vanessa works on the firm’s most complex engagements, walking alongside clients throughout their transformation journey – in addition to helping drive Kotter’s ongoing research & development efforts. She has written on the topics of leadership and change for outlets such as Harvard Business Review, MIT Sloan, Forbes, Huffington Post, Chief Executive Magazine, Education News, Training Magazine and others; and provided commentary to a number of media outlets on the topics of employee engagement, supply chain transformation and digital transformation. She is the co-author of the book Change: How Organizations Create Hard-to-Imagine Results Despite Uncertain and Volatile Times (Wiley) with Dr. John Kotter and Gaurav Gupta.
