How Real Connection Changes People, Teams and Culture
An interactive keynote with Dr. Barry Auchettl
Creator of Conversations: An Inspirational Game
We have never had more ways to communicate. Between texts, emails, Zoom, Teams, social media, meetings and constant notifications, most of us are communicating from the moment we wake up until the end of the day.
But are we actually connecting?
In this highly interactive keynote, Dr. Barry Auchettl invites audiences to move beyond surface conversation and rediscover something profoundly human: the experience of truly seeing, hearing and understanding one another.
This isn't a keynote people simply listen to. They experience it.
[BOOK BARRY FOR YOUR EVENT]
The ability to shape one's own life autonomously, develop inner authority, and make authentic decisions independent of external expectations
Recognizing and communicating personal boundaries to foster healthy relationships and protect one's energy.
Identifying and transforming limiting beliefs that block personal growth into empowering convictions that release potential.
Developing deep trust in one's own ability to master challenges and achieve desired results.
Cultivating conscious attention in the present moment to gain clarity and strengthen one's influence in various areas of life.
Learn powerful techniques to release these limitations and create space for transformation.
Think about the conversations happening in your organization every day. Many of them are about tasks, deadlines, problems, performance, schedules, meetings and what needs to happen next.
All of those conversations are necessary, but how many actually help people understand one another?
Behind every job title is a human being with a story, a perspective, a set of experiences and something they care about. Yet we can work beside someone for years without ever really knowing who they are.
Barry believes one of the greatest untapped resources inside any organization is surprisingly simple:
The quality of the conversations people are willing to have.
The ability to shape one's own life autonomously, develop inner authority, and make authentic decisions independent of external expectations
Recognizing and communicating personal boundaries to foster healthy relationships and protect one's energy.
Identifying and transforming limiting beliefs that block personal growth into empowering convictions that release potential.
Developing deep trust in one's own ability to master challenges and achieve desired results.
Cultivating conscious attention in the present moment to gain clarity and strengthen one's influence in various areas of life.
Learn powerful techniques to release these limitations and create space for transformation.
WHAT HAPPENS WHEN WE REALLY LISTEN?
When people stop preparing their next answer and become genuinely curious about another person's experience, something changes. Assumptions begin to soften, walls come down and people who have worked beside each other for years can suddenly discover something they never knew.
Someone who has previously felt overlooked may finally feel seen, heard and valued.
This is why Barry doesn't simply talk about connection. He creates opportunities for people to experience it in the room.
THIS IS NOT YOUR TYPICAL KEYNOTE
Your audience becomes part of the experience.
Barry introduces carefully designed questions and experiences inspired by Conversations: An Inspirational Game, which he created more than 20 years ago.
People may turn to someone sitting beside them and respond to a question they weren't expecting. Very quickly, the energy in the room begins to change. People laugh, share stories and listen differently. Complete strangers can discover remarkable things about one another, while colleagues who thought they knew each other can suddenly see each other in a completely new way.
The keynote is no longer happening only on the stage.
It's happening throughout the room.
That's what makes Barry's approach different. People don't just hear a message about connection; they experience connection for themselves.
The ability to shape one's own life autonomously, develop inner authority, and make authentic decisions independent of external expectations
Recognizing and communicating personal boundaries to foster healthy relationships and protect one's energy.
Identifying and transforming limiting beliefs that block personal growth into empowering convictions that release potential.
Developing deep trust in one's own ability to master challenges and achieve desired results.
Cultivating conscious attention in the present moment to gain clarity and strengthen one's influence in various areas of life.
Learn powerful techniques to release these limitations and create space for transformation.
Barry explores three very different levels of conversation.
TALKING
Most everyday conversation involves exchanging information. What happened? What needs doing? What's next? This is necessary and useful, particularly in organizations, but it can easily remain transactional.
LISTENING
The second level begins when we stop simply waiting for our turn to speak and become curious about another person's experience. We start listening not only for information, but for meaning.
CONNECTING
The third level happens when we move beyond roles, titles and assumptions and begin to encounter the person in front of us. This is where understanding grows, relationships deepen and the quality of communication begins to change.
The ability to shape one's own life autonomously, develop inner authority, and make authentic decisions independent of external expectations
Recognizing and communicating personal boundaries to foster healthy relationships and protect one's energy.
Identifying and transforming limiting beliefs that block personal growth into empowering convictions that release potential.
Developing deep trust in one's own ability to master challenges and achieve desired results.
Cultivating conscious attention in the present moment to gain clarity and strengthen one's influence in various areas of life.
Learn powerful techniques to release these limitations and create space for transformation.
While creating Conversations: An Inspirational Game, Barry discovered something deceptively simple: the right question can change a relationship.
Not because the question itself is magical, but because a great question gives people permission to go somewhere ordinary conversation rarely goes.
Instead of simply asking, “What do you do?”, imagine asking, “What are you most proud of that people here probably don't know about?”
Instead of “How's work?”, imagine asking, “What would help you feel more valued here?”
And instead of automatically asking “How are you?”, imagine creating enough space to genuinely hear the answer.
Great questions open doors. The real skill is learning how to walk through them together.
The ability to shape one's own life autonomously, develop inner authority, and make authentic decisions independent of external expectations
Recognizing and communicating personal boundaries to foster healthy relationships and protect one's energy.
Identifying and transforming limiting beliefs that block personal growth into empowering convictions that release potential.
Developing deep trust in one's own ability to master challenges and achieve desired results.
Cultivating conscious attention in the present moment to gain clarity and strengthen one's influence in various areas of life.
Learn powerful techniques to release these limitations and create space for transformation.
More than two decades ago, Barry created Conversations: An Inspirational Game around a simple idea: what would happen if people were given better questions and permission to move beyond superficial conversation?
Something unexpected happened. People didn't simply play the game. They connected.
Families discovered things they had never spoken about. Colleagues saw different sides of one another. Strangers became friends, and teams began understanding the people behind the roles.
Through those experiences, Barry came to recognize something that has shaped his work ever since:
People want meaningful connection. They often just need permission and a pathway to create it.
That discovery became the foundation of Barry's work with Conversations in organizations, communities, groups and events.
The ability to shape one's own life autonomously, develop inner authority, and make authentic decisions independent of external expectations
Recognizing and communicating personal boundaries to foster healthy relationships and protect one's energy.
Identifying and transforming limiting beliefs that block personal growth into empowering convictions that release potential.
Developing deep trust in one's own ability to master challenges and achieve desired results.
Cultivating conscious attention in the present moment to gain clarity and strengthen one's influence in various areas of life.
Learn powerful techniques to release these limitations and create space for transformation.
WHY THIS MATTERS TO ORGANIZATIONS
Culture isn't simply what appears in a company values statement. It is created every day through conversations: what people feel safe enough to say, what leaders are willing to hear, how disagreement is handled, whether curiosity replaces assumption and whether people genuinely feel that they belong.
The quality of those conversations can influence trust, collaboration, leadership, communication, belonging, conflict, engagement, creativity and team cohesion.
When people communicate differently, relationships begin to change. When relationships change, culture can change with them.
WHAT YOUR AUDIENCE WILL TAKE AWAY
Participants will discover how better questions can move conversations beyond the surface and create greater understanding. They will experience the difference between simply hearing someone and genuinely listening, while recognizing how quickly assumptions about another person can change when curiosity replaces judgment.
The keynote also gives people simple practices they can use immediately with colleagues, teams, clients, friends and family.
Most importantly, participants don't simply learn about human connection.
They experience it.
The ability to shape one's own life autonomously, develop inner authority, and make authentic decisions independent of external expectations
Recognizing and communicating personal boundaries to foster healthy relationships and protect one's energy.
Identifying and transforming limiting beliefs that block personal growth into empowering convictions that release potential.
Developing deep trust in one's own ability to master challenges and achieve desired results.
Cultivating conscious attention in the present moment to gain clarity and strengthen one's influence in various areas of life.
Learn powerful techniques to release these limitations and create space for transformation.
I bring in a number of authors from around the world to speak at Unity’s service followed with workshop or seminar. I work with Learning Annex here and I am their Calgary representative as well a new larger company that is in Canada called the Power Within. They are the people that brought Pres. Bill Clinton to Canada to speak last fall. We have an author speaking at least once a month. Barry is one of the best speakers we have enjoyed at our service. His average guy attitude put everyone at ease and he helped us go through a little exercise in our service that had everyone talking about how much they enjoyed it. As people talked from their hearts and we got to connect with each other on a deeper level. AS you can see, by the companies I work with that I have experienced many varieties of speakers over the years. I have not had the desire to take many workshops or seminars because I am used to the high level speakers. Barry’s workshop was a blessing and helped me see the answers in my own life. As well as the connection with the other people was amazing how deep our conversation went.
Sheryl Guillaume, Evolving Doors Productions, Canada
Each year we take all our staff away for a few days to plan the next 12 months and to build relationships within our team. Building relationships within the team is often better handle from outside the team, so it was with this in mind we started looking for a suitable co-ordinator. J.K Personnel recommended Mr Barry Auchettl, after we explained what we were trying to achieve. Director, Jennifer Kelly, felt the board game would help build relationships as it had when used by her company. On a lovely sunny day at Apollo Bay, Barry led us through the Game. All the team members contributed and felt it was a benefit to them and evidence shows that it has continued to help us 6 months later. It is therefore we recommend the Game to other companies and institutions.
Bernard Kelly, Haydens Real Estate, Australia
The ability to shape one's own life autonomously, develop inner authority, and make authentic decisions independent of external expectations
Recognizing and communicating personal boundaries to foster healthy relationships and protect one's energy.
Identifying and transforming limiting beliefs that block personal growth into empowering convictions that release potential.
Developing deep trust in one's own ability to master challenges and achieve desired results.
Cultivating conscious attention in the present moment to gain clarity and strengthen one's influence in various areas of life.
Learn powerful techniques to release these limitations and create space for transformation.
Dr. Barry Auchettl has spent more than 35 years exploring vision, perception, behaviour, education, communication and human potential. He is an author, educator, international speaker and the creator of Conversations: An Inspirational Game.
Barry brings together storytelling, humour, audience participation, unexpected questions and meaningful human interaction. Rather than speaking at an audience for an hour, he creates an environment where people become part of the presentation.
He has an unusual ability to take a room of people who may barely know each other and create the conditions for meaningful conversations to happen remarkably quickly.
This makes the keynote particularly suited to corporate conferences, leadership events, team retreats, association conferences, culture and engagement events, professional development programs, community gatherings and personal development events.
The ability to shape one's own life autonomously, develop inner authority, and make authentic decisions independent of external expectations
Recognizing and communicating personal boundaries to foster healthy relationships and protect one's energy.
Identifying and transforming limiting beliefs that block personal growth into empowering convictions that release potential.
Developing deep trust in one's own ability to master challenges and achieve desired results.
Cultivating conscious attention in the present moment to gain clarity and strengthen one's influence in various areas of life.
Learn powerful techniques to release these limitations and create space for transformation.
Barry's interactive approach has been used for more than two decades to help people move beyond ordinary conversation and connect at a deeper level.
Sheryl Guillaume of Evolving Doors Productions described Barry as “one of the best speakers we have enjoyed at our service,” highlighting the way his exercises encouraged people to speak from the heart and connect more deeply.
Bernard Kelly of Haydens Real Estate used Barry and Conversations during a staff retreat designed to strengthen team relationships. Importantly, the impact wasn't simply felt on the day. Six months later, they reported that the experience was still benefiting the team.
That's the difference Barry wants to create: not just a memorable hour, but a different way of communicating after people leave the room.
The ability to shape one's own life autonomously, develop inner authority, and make authentic decisions independent of external expectations
Recognizing and communicating personal boundaries to foster healthy relationships and protect one's energy.
Identifying and transforming limiting beliefs that block personal growth into empowering convictions that release potential.
Developing deep trust in one's own ability to master challenges and achieve desired results.
Cultivating conscious attention in the present moment to gain clarity and strengthen one's influence in various areas of life.
Learn powerful techniques to release these limitations and create space for transformation.
One of the unique opportunities with this keynote is that the experience can continue long after the event itself.
Organizations can incorporate Conversations: An Inspirational Game into team retreats, leadership development, staff onboarding, culture-building initiatives, facilitated conversations, client events and community experiences.
This means the keynote can become more than a one-hour presentation. It can be the beginning of an ongoing conversation about how people communicate, listen and connect.
Hundreds of people arrive at your event. Some know each other well, others only by name, and many are complete strangers.
Barry takes the stage and, at some point, a question appears. People turn toward each other and conversations begin. The noise in the room rises as people laugh, share and discover things they weren't expecting.
For a few minutes, titles, departments and status become less important. What matters is the human being sitting opposite you.
That is the room Barry wants to create.
The ability to shape one's own life autonomously, develop inner authority, and make authentic decisions independent of external expectations
Recognizing and communicating personal boundaries to foster healthy relationships and protect one's energy.
Identifying and transforming limiting beliefs that block personal growth into empowering convictions that release potential.
Developing deep trust in one's own ability to master challenges and achieve desired results.
Cultivating conscious attention in the present moment to gain clarity and strengthen one's influence in various areas of life.
Learn powerful techniques to release these limitations and create space for transformation.
The ability to shape one's own life autonomously, develop inner authority, and make authentic decisions independent of external expectations
Recognizing and communicating personal boundaries to foster healthy relationships and protect one's energy.
Identifying and transforming limiting beliefs that block personal growth into empowering convictions that release potential.
Developing deep trust in one's own ability to master challenges and achieve desired results.
Cultivating conscious attention in the present moment to gain clarity and strengthen one's influence in various areas of life.
Learn powerful techniques to release these limitations and create space for transformation.
A great conference doesn't simply give people more information. It gives them an experience they remember and something they take back into their lives and organizations.
Your next event doesn't need another speaker telling people that communication matters.
Give your audience the opportunity to discover why it matters for themselves.
THE CONVERSATION WE'RE NOT HAVING
How Real Connection Changes People, Teams and Culture
With Dr. Barry Auchettl
Creator of Conversations: An Inspirational Game
Let's start a conversation.
The ability to shape one's own life autonomously, develop inner authority, and make authentic decisions independent of external expectations
Recognizing and communicating personal boundaries to foster healthy relationships and protect one's energy.
Identifying and transforming limiting beliefs that block personal growth into empowering convictions that release potential.
Developing deep trust in one's own ability to master challenges and achieve desired results.
Cultivating conscious attention in the present moment to gain clarity and strengthen one's influence in various areas of life.
Learn powerful techniques to release these limitations and create space for transformation.
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