Robyn Benincasa Speaker Biography
Top Leadership and Teamwork Motivational Speaker, Adventure Racing World Champion, CNN Hero, and Bestselling Author
Robyn Benincasa is the founder of World Class Teams, a world champion adventure racer, a CNN Hero, former corporate sales expert and a full time firefighter who advises organizations on building World Class Teams of their own. One of the highest rated female speakers who regularly shares the stage with world leaders and business icons, her customers include many Fortune companies like Starbucks, Deloitte, Aflac, Fast Company, Boeing, Lockheed Martin, ARAMARK, Siemens, 3M, Coldwell Banker, Ameriprise, Microsoft, AT&T. With a background in marketing, she was previously in corporate sales with Baxter and Allergan and is currently a full-time firefighter. World Champion Eco-Challenge Adventure Racer, CNN Hero, Founder of the Project Athena Foundation (Survivors to Athletes!), 3x Guinness World Record Distance Paddler and proud owner of 2 metal ‘bionic hips’, Robyn definitely knows a thing or two about creating Human Synergy – “that magic that allows groups of ordinary people to accomplish extraordinary things together.” Her New York Times best-selling book How Winning Works, published by Harlequin has been reviewed as “an excellent resource for all business owners on approaching challenges with a team mentality.”
Leadership
For the last 20 years, she and her teammates have been competing at the front of the pack in the most unique and compelling classrooms on earth – the jungles of Borneo, the Himalayan peaks of Tibet, the rivers of Fiji, the rainforests of Ecuador and the desert of Namibia – studying the good, the bad, and the not-so-pretty in extreme teamwork and mastering the skills required to inspire a group of semi-exhausted people through a seemingly endless series of checkpoints, in pursuit of a seemingly impossible goal, working against crazy deadlines, in constantly changing conditions and all in pursuit of a huge hairy audacious goal. Sounds a lot like your life as a business leader, right?
Teamwork
It is through these harrowing, life affirming and often hilarious experiences in the world’s most grueling challenges that she has emerged with her refreshing and truly unique perspective on what it takes to build the kind of World Class Teams that succeed against all odds, that triumph in the face of adversity and that win as one in times of great challenge and change. Whether you’re trying to beat the competition to market, scale a looming mountain of a project or simply get your team all marching in the same direction, Robyn’s 8 Essential Elements of Human Synergy will coach you to the finish line of success.
Founder of Project Athena
Project Athena “It’s not about the setback, it’s about the comeback!” Robyn Benincasa became a CNN Hero in 2014 for founding the Project Athena Foundation, a 501c3 non-profit that helps women survivors of medical and other traumatic setbacks achieve their adventurous dreams. The Project Athena Foundation has enabled hundreds of survivors and their supporters to meet heroic initiatives like trekking the Grand Canyon rim to rim, or kayaking and cycling from Key Largo to Key West, or conquering their first 5k. Project Athena provides travel expenses, coaching, equipment, and most importantly, the encouragement and inspiration needed to make the transition from Survivor to Athlete.
Media
NBC, ABC, CNN, ESPN, USA Network, The Today Show, Live With Regis, Dateline NBC, The Discovery Channel, Vogue, Harpers Bazaar, Runners World and Outside Magazine have all featured Robyn and her teams’ amazing accomplishments. And Robyn accepts full blame for inspiring people to do insane things like climb Mount Kilimanjaro, run their first triathlon, start their own adventure racing teams, hike across the Grand Canyon with a group of Survivors, or start their own businesses.
This is, after all, who she is and what she does: Robyn Benincasa inspires people to grab life with one hand, grab their teammates with the other, and to create that special magic that makes all of us better together than we ever would have been alone!
Robyn Benincasa Speaking Topics
Adapt, Overcome, and Win as One! Get Ready to Win YOUR Most Challenging Races… Add the Inspirational Force of Leadership and Performance to Your Next Event!
If there’s one thing we can all be certain of right now, it’s that change is the only thing that’s going to stay the same. It’s our response to that change that dictates our success. So how do we as leaders inspire the kind of mindset and build the kind of teams that drive our organizations to adapt, overcome and win as ONE in the face of times of extreme challenge and change? This unique and fast-paced multimedia keynote is inspired by a Fast Company Magazine feature story entitled “Extreme Teamwork” about Robyn’s World Champion Adventure Racing team. Robyn shares the Secrets to Extreme Teamwork that allowed her team to be the most prolific and consistent World Champions in the sport, lessons that are easily applied to the adventures in our business lives. Their team culture of innovation, visionary creativity, relentless lead building, and embracing calculated risk as a strategy for success made them one of the most exciting and successful teams in the history of adventure sports, and in Robyn’s Adapt, Overcome, and Win as One keynote, she shares the mindset and strategies that created their consistent breakthrough performance. AND Each Virtual Keynote includes a full super experienced tech team on Robyn's end to ensure everyone's success in creating the magic! You book the event, and our team makes you look like a rockstar.
Why Winners Win: What are the common attributes of people who make a lifelong habit of winning… and who succeed against all odds?
Drawing inspiration from Robyn’s team of World Champion adventure athletes as well as Winners from all walks of life, Why Winners Win uncovers the common traits and attitudes of the world’s most consistent high performers. The Best of the Best experience times of great challenge and change just like everyone else; but with characteristic Courage, Luck (Opportunity + Preparation), Adversity Management Skills, and a keen ability to create Synergy with their colleagues, they possess the ability to continually motivate and inspire themselves and those around them to the top of the podium in any endeavor. This inspiring keynote addresses the following goals, dreams and themes: • Teaching and leveraging a game-changing strategy that shifts one’s mindset from “not losing” to winning. • Embracing times of great challenge and change as a springboard to future success. • Empowering continuous improvement to spur change and reinvent the game. • Capitalizing on resources and building a world class team to achieve even bigger goals. • Demonstrating the importance and value of G.U.T.S. (Going the Distance, Unwavering in your patience and faith, Taking Calculated Risks and Shattering the Norm). • Solidifying how Luck is a proven formula of Opportunity + Preparation that drives peak performance and consistent results.
Building World Class Teams: How to Achieve Breakthrough Performance Through Collaboration, Creativity, and A Culture of ONE
How do you inspire individual team members to become great teammates? What if your teams were not only driven to achieve goals with each other but FOR each other? The world’s most successful teams have one thing in common: Human Synergy, which Robyn describes as ”the magic that allows groups of ordinary people to accomplish extraordinary things together.” If your goal is to take a group of successful individuals and make them successful as a team, this team-building keynote is the perfect message to set the tone for your event! Robyn’s most requested keynote is based on her best-selling book, "How Winning Works: 8 Essential Leadership Lessons From The Toughest Teams On Earth". Robyn’s innovative team-building strategies offer practical tools to adapt, overcome, and win as ONE, against all odds. In this fast-paced, story-driven keynote, Robyn Benincasa takes your group on a multimedia adventure which visually and viscerally imparts the mindset that allows teams to adapt, overcome, and win as ONE even when the stakes are high and the only thing constant is change. Your world class team will discover that achieving at peak levels isn’t about only reaching UP and trying harder as an individual, but reaching OUT and sharing strengths, talents, and challenges within a World Class Team. Robyn gets attendees buzzing with inspired ideas about how to raise their team to the next level, both personally and professionally. And they’ll take home simple and easily applied skills that will cultivate deep and lasting connections in any team. The hallmark of a world class team is when they’re not only working WITH each other, but FOR each other. – Robyn
Inspiring Greatness Through G.R.I.T.: Creating The Passion To Pursue The Impossible
What inspires the resilience to chase challenging finish lines and achieve world class results in times of incredible challenge and change? How do we create the passion and internal drive to pursue goals that seem impossible? We create this kind of greatness in ourselves and our teammates through G.R.I.T! G.R.I.T is that magical combination of: • GUTS • RESPECT for our teammates and the mission • INNOVATION • TEAMWORK that makes us “sticky” to our goals and dreams. In this keynote, Robyn shares the real secret to her and her teams’ success over 20 years of leading the pack in the sport of adventure racing and as a San Diego Firefighter—their “we will find a way or make one” attitude, their love of the mission, their deep respect for one another, their ingenious solutions and white space thinking, their intensive preparation for all contingencies and conditions, and their incredible ability to not just work with each other, but FOR each other. Having the GRIT to go the distance in any endeavor isn’t just a matter of mental fortitude. Much of our endurance and drive to succeed in those tough times when others would quit comes from our connection to something greater than ourselves, the inspiration that comes from mission driven innovation, the passion we have for our goals and the people whose lives we will touch along the way, the understanding that we are writing our life story during our most difficult challenges, and the respect for a team whose success is inextricably tied to ours. When you leave Robyn’s Inspiring Greatness Through G.R.I.T keynote, you will have a deep understanding of how to create GRIT in your own life and in your team culture, but most importantly, you’ll be on a mission to inspire that GRIT in everyone who is lucky enough to know you—- the kind of leader every organization needs to help them climb their tallest peaks, fight their biggest fires, and cross their most challenging finish lines…
Stay SAFER - How Great Leaders Inspire “Commitment” Versus “Compliance”
In her “why bad accidents happen to good people” safety keynote, Robyn Benincasa takes your team on a compelling and unforgettable multimedia adventure, including video footage and analysis of preventable disasters and thrilling safety success stories from the worlds of adventure sports and firefighting. This World Champion Adventure Racer, San Diego Firefighter, and New York Times Best Selling Author offers unique, simple, yet extremely effective tools for inspiring the people that we work with and work for to be SAFER every day! Why Do Bad Accidents Happen to Good People? According to research, it’s as simple as ABCD: A – Attitude: Not Me, Not This Time, Not My Place, Not My Job B - Background and Preparation C - Circumstances (Preventable or Non-Preventable? Hint: 80% are preventable!) D - Decisions How Do We Inspire People to be SAFER? S – Synergy: Seeing one another as TEAMMATES vs simply colleagues. We are better…together! A – Adapt – Situational awareness, focus on what it takes to “win” when it comes to safety/survival versus “not lose” F – Follow your R’s! Rules, Roles, Regulations and Routine Procedures restore order to extraordinary circumstances E - Educate and Engage: Move your teammates from Compliance (because they’ll be caught) to Commitment (because they CARE) R – Respect the risk/benefit ratio of your actions, and respect yourself, your teamates and your family to DWR (Do What’s Right) Attendees will go home feeling truly inspired and empowered to keep themselves and their teammates safe because they ‘want’ to, not because they ‘have’ to. And they will leave with the desire to be a hero to their new teammates–not just the kind of hero that rushes into danger to save them, but the kind of hero that KEEPS them from endangering themselves and others. With a SAFER mindset, we ensure that the most important goal of all is achieved at the end of the day…Everyone Goes Home.
Robyn Benincasa Books
How Winning Works: 8 Essential Leadership Lessons from the Toughest Teams on Earth
Purchase BookRobyn Benincasa Videos
Robyn Benincasa Articles
- CELEBRATING HER STORY – Top Strong Women Keynote Speakers for Women’s History Month
- Top Corporate and Sales Kickoff Speakers for 2025 Meetings
- Top Ten Leadership Speakers in 2024 at Speakers.com
- Meet the Masters of Motivation: Speakers.com’s Top Keynote Speaker Lineup
- Top 10 Resilience Speakers at Speakers.com
Robyn Benincasa Speaker Testimonials
"The Dwyer Group has celebrated 33 annual reunions and this year’s was a record turnout with a World Class keynote speaker. Robyn Benincasa really moved our franchisees forward with her real-life stories and the message that 'nobody wins alone.' Thanks to Robyn’s desire to inspire we are a better company!"
- | The Dwyer Group, Inc.
“You definitely helped us strengthen the core of our leaders and made such a positive impact. We’re grateful for your contribution to our conference.”
- Tastefully Simple | Theresa Moberg, Vice President of Training & Development
“Hi Robyn, thank you so much for presenting at our meeting yesterday in Philly. You were a big hit with everyone and are truly an inspiration. Your energy and enthusiasm hit the mark.”
- Laboratory Products Association | Clark Mulligan
“Robyn – thank you for supporting our S4 Keynote on Tuesday. I had a chance to read some of the feedback and speak to the attendees and they were very positive on your presentation. You did a great job aligning the message to our Enterprise Sales strategy as well—one team, coming together and helping each other to win. We even had people using some of your quotes to describe business challenges!”
- Worldwide Specialist Sales | John Jester, Vice President
