Margaret Heffernan

Margaret Heffernan is a successful entrepreneur, Chief Executive and author. She was born in Texas, raised in Holland and educated at Cambridge University. For five years, she worked for BBC Radio where she wrote, directed, produced and commissioned numerous documentaries and dramas. As a television producer, she made documentary films for Timewatch, Arena, and Newsnight.

She was one of the producers of Out of the Dolls House, the prize-winning documentary series about the history of women in the twentieth century. Margaret has also produced music videos with Virgin Records and the London Chamber Orchestra with the goal of raising attention and funds for Unicefs Lebanese fund.

Leaving the BBC, she ran the trade association IPPA, which represented the interests of independent film and television producers and was once described by the Financial Times as the most formidable lobbying organization in England.

Upon returning to the United States, in 1994, she worked on public affair campaigns in Massachusetts and with software companies trying to break into multimedia. During this time she helped develop interactive multimedia products with Peter Lynch, Tom Peters, Standard & Poors and The Learning Company.

She later joined CMGI where she ran, bought and sold leading Internet businesses, serving as Chief Executive Officer for InfoMation Corporation, ZineZone Corporation as well as iCAST Corporation. By 1999, she was named one of the Internets Top 100 by Silicon Alley Reporter, one of the Top 25 by Streaming Media magazine and one of the Top 100 Media Executives by The Hollywood Reporter. She received the Silver SABRE award for public relations as a result of her Tear Down the Wall campaign against AOL.

2011 was the year when Margarets third book, Willful Blindness was published and shortlisted for the Financial Times/Goldman Sachs Best Business Book award. She is currently a Visiting Professor of Entrepreneurship at Simmons College in Boston and Executive in Residence at Babson College. She is a Trustee of the London Library and sits on the Council of the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art and in the UK as well as one the boards of several private companies. Margaret blogs for the Huffington Post in the US and the UK, for CBSMoneywatch and for Inc.com.

You may have seen her featured on television in The Secret Millionaire or experienced her on BBC Radio 4 in Changing the Rules, which won the 2008 Prowess Media Award. She has had three plays broadcast by the BBC and in 2011 has been awarded an honorary doctorate from the University of Bath. She is married with two children. She has a 4th book due out in 2014.

She is able to deliver powerful keynotes focused on business, success, motivation and talent.