While we cannot control our life circumstances, we can control our responses.
What does it really mean to be resilient? Are some people born with a resilience gene or can it be taught? Can resilience truly help put us back in the driver's seat of life? If so, how? These are some of the questions that Global Authority on Resilience Dr Lucy Hone addressed last year, with 30,000 people globally, in keynotes and training sessions focused on creating Realistic Resilience Practices that work.
A renowned global expert on resilience, the Director of the New Zealand Institute of Wellbeing & Resilience, and blogger for Psychology Today, Lucy offers a one-of-kind perspective - sharpened through academia but also deeply personally applied in response to a devastating tragedy. Her focus on helping people and organisations create practical resilience strategies is a call to action in light of many feeling resilience fatigues.
Lucy's mission to translate the best of resilience psychology for everyday practice inspired her to create a keynote entitled, Three Secrets of Resilient People, which became one of the most-watched TED talks during the pandemic, with over 9 million views and has been translated into 15 languages.
Known as a respected change agent on this timely topic, Lucy is also an award-winning ˜pracademic with a Masters's degree in resilience psychology from the University of Pennsylvania and a Ph.D. in wellbeing science/public health from AUT University in Auckland.
Her ground-breaking research is published in leading peer-reviewed international journals and frequently cited by others. She now assists various organizations ranging from Fortune 500s, government agencies and law firms to community groups and schools to design and implement wellbeing and resilience initiatives, re-shaping how resilience is viewed and creating sustained and meaningful change.
Describing her role as a pracademic, Lucy explains, too many resilience researchers don't know how to communicate their studies, and too many presenters don't really understand the science's nuances and theories underpinning it. I love being a pracademic who truly gets the evidence, but also relishes the challenge of presenting it to people to improve their everyday lives.
A Bestselling Author, Lucy's books include Resilient Grieving, which details how she coped with her own unimaginable personal loss, and her latest book, The Educators Guide to Whole-School Wellbeing, which addresses challenges faced by schools wanting to improve wellbeing in their school communities.
She is also regularly featured in the global media including The Guardian, The Washington Post and the BBC.
Dr Lucy Hone's goal is to help anyone struggling through change, uncertainty, or loss re-learn how to live in the world around them. In this day and age, everyone needs skills to be resilient. Lucy has helped millions of people realise that an energised, meaningful, joy-filled life is attainable no matter the challenge that lies in front of you.
Talking Points
Three Secrets of Resilient People (extended version of the TED talk)
Based on Lucy’s TED Talk with over 9 million views, this keynote unpacks the three evidence-based strategies used by the world’s most resilient people—those who manage to face the worst and somehow keep going. It’s warm, moving, and deeply practical.Three Secrets of Resilient People (extended version of the TED talk)
Themes: Resilience, Coping with loss, Inspirational leadership, Navigating change
Perfect for:
-Teams faced with disruption
- Educators
- Health and emergency responders
- Community leaders
- Associations
Modern Loss: Tools for a New Era of Care (Grief 101)
Grief is universal, but our approaches to it are often outdated or missing altogether. This keynote introduces Resilient Grieving™—a science-backed, practical framework that helps health and care professionals feel more confident supporting people through loss. No jargon. No five stages. Just tools that work.Modern Loss: Tools for a New Era of Care (Grief 101)
Themes: Resilient Grieving™, Post-traumatic growth, Grief Literacy, Human connection
Perfect for:
-Health care & coaches
- Palliative care
- Counsellors
- Funeral industry
- Mental Health Awareness Week/Month
- HR
The Hard Truths That Make Better Leaders
Loss, grief and personal struggle are often avoided at work. But leaders who own their hard truths, don’t lose credibility, they build it. This talk challenges outdated leadership ideals and reframes adversity as a source of strength, trust and connection. Perfect for leaders/exec teams ready to rethink leadership and understand post-traumatic growth.The Hard Truths That Make Better Leaders
Themes: Emotional intelligence, Team trust, Post-traumatic growth, Thought leadership
Perfect for:
- Senior leaders
- People managers
- HR professionals
- Exec teams & boards
Post-Traumatic Growth: The Surprising Science of Human Recovery
We’ve all heard of Post-traumatic Stress. But far fewer people know about its more hopeful counterpart—Post-Traumatic Growth. In this keynote, Dr Lucy Hone introduces a research-backed approach to understanding how hardship can become a catalyst for insight, strength and renewed purpose.Post-Traumatic Growth: The Surprising Science of Human Recovery
Perfect for audiences navigating disruption, or those who support others through it, this talk extends one-sided trauma narratives with science, story, and the possibility of growth.
Themes: Recovery science, Human potential, Growth after trauma, Hopeful leadership
Perfect for:
- Health professionals
- Coaches
- Educators
- Community leaders
- Change agents
- Disaster recovery & First responders
Resilient Mindsets: Thriving Through Uncertainty & Change
In a world of constant disruption, this keynote equips teams with practical, science-backed strategies to navigate uncertainty and challenge by adopting a Resilient Mindset. Resilient Mindsets: Thriving Through Uncertainty & Change
Dr Lucy Hone draws on three decades of robust research to rethink what it means to cope well—and shows how mental agility equips teams to approach change constructively, and support each other through the unknown with confidence and strength.
Themes: Collective resilience, Psychological safety, Hope & optimism, Attention management, Psych Flex & mental agility
Perfect for:
- Workplace teams
- Educators
- First responders
- Corporate groups
- Exec teams & boards
What’s Your Why? A Panel on Meaning, Purpose and Belonging
What makes work meaningful—and how can we help others find it? This dynamic session opens with insights from the new science of meaning—unpacking coherence, significance and purpose—followed by a panel conversation exploring how people from diverse backgrounds find meaning in their work. What’s Your Why? A Panel on Meaning, Purpose and Belonging
Designed especially for Associations and Membership organisations, it invites you to reframe work as something deeper than a job title or pay cheque.
Themes: Meaning at work, Personal values, Intergenerational understanding, Belonging in the workplace
Perfect for:
- Membership associations
- Industry conferences
- Values-led organisations
- Gen Z
Video
Dr Lucy Hone | Global Authority on Coping with Uncertainty, Disruption & Change
In this compelling showreel, internationally respected resilience expert Dr. Lucy Hone shares her unique approach to helping individuals and organisations navigate disruption, uncertainty, stress, and change. With over 15 years of research in resilience psychology and psychological well-being—combined with her own lived experience—Lucy delivers practical tools and strategies that truly work when life gets tough. Whether you’re looking to boost team performance, improve workplace culture, or support your people through adversity, Lucy’s keynotes, workshops, and masterclasses are designed to spark real human connection and create lasting impact.The Three Secrets of Resilient People | Dr Lucy Hone | TEDxChristchurch
Dr Lucy Hone is a resilience expert who thought she found her calling supporting people to recover following the Christchurch earthquake. She had no idea that her personal journey was about to take her to a far darker place. In this powerful and courageous talk, she shares the three strategies that got her through an unimaginable tragedy?and offers a profound insight on human suffering. Dr Lucy Hone is a director of the New Zealand Institute of Wellbeing & Resilience, a research associate at AUT University, a published academic researcher, best-selling author and contributor to Psychology Today, the Sunday Star Times and Next magazine. She trained at the University of Pennsylvania and got her PhD in public health at AUT University in Auckland. She has helped a range of organisationsfrom primary schools to leading law firmsto design and implement wellbeing initiatives creating sustained and meaningful change. Five years ago, the sudden death of Lucy's 12-year-old daughter Abi forced Lucy to turn her academic training and professional practice to foster resilience in very personal circumstances. The blog she wrote in the aftermath of Abi's death attracted international attention and resulted in the best-selling non-fiction title, What Abi Taught Us, Strategies for Resilient Grieving (Allen & Unwin, 2016), now available as Resilient Grieving in the US, UK and NZ.Dr Lucy Hone | Is it helping or harming? | Saxton Live powered by Delegate Connect
Dr Lucy Hone is an Adjunct Senior Professor at the University of Canterbury, a co-director of the New Zealand Institute of Wellbeing & Resilience, a published academic researcher and best-selling author and blogger for Psychology Today.Dr Lucy Hone | Ordinary Magic | Saxton Live Powered by Delegate Connect
Dr Lucy Hone is an Adjunct Senior Professor at the University of Canterbury, a co-director of the New Zealand Institute of Wellbeing & Resilience, a published academic researcher and best-selling author and blogger for Psychology Today.Audio
Thank you for sharing this conversation with me today. I feel as though I benefited greatly from having had the opportunity to speak with you firsthand, and suspect that many of those in the ... keep reading San Diego State University
Probably the most beneficial talk I have ever listened to. Fantastic speaker. Inspirational. Excellent presentation and useful strategies. The most relevant information for me at this conference.
We were incredibly excited to have Dr. Lucy Hone zoom in to chat with us as part of our Mental Wellbeing Month activations this October. and wow - she didn't disappoint! It was one of the most impactful firesides/chats we have ever put on (and we do quite a lot here at Canva!). Dr. Hone's research around resilience absolutely resonated with our team and her actionable steps were bang on. Would definitely recommend!
On behalf of the Finance Commercialization Event planning team thank you very much for your engagement on our Global Finance Meeting and for contributing to the success of our meeting. Your presentation was tailored to our needs, you showed a lot of flexibility and consideration to our needs and we have received very nice feedback. Many thanks for the materials you sent us to support your presentation and workshop.
Dr Lucy was a highlight of our Conference this year, just as she was at our Leadership Forum in 2021. Her delivery in not only professional and relevant, she provides practical advice that anyone can utilise, just sensational.
Dr Lucy Hone is both an engaging and insightful speaker. Not only did our conference delegates really enjoy her presentation, Q&A session and subsequent panel, she was great for us to work with as organisers.
I have seen lots of different speakers talk about resilience and Dr Lucy is one of the best. She makes the content relatable and accessible.
Lucy was a fantastic speaker who effortlessly wove her personal experiences in to her keynote to help empower and inspire our audience. She was incredibly personable and motivational while acknowledging the unique barriers of our audience in the ECE sector.
Lucy is clearly very accomplished in her field but makes her work accessible and applicable for the audience. Lucy blended her personal story and practical tips into an insightful and relevant presentation that held everyone's attention.
We invited Lucy to speak to our Senior Leaders and also complete a workshop with them to give them tangible tools to use for themselves and within their teams. Our audience was very engaged and appreciated the tools given to enable them to lead resilient teams within our business.
Lucy was determined to make the events she did for us relevant and with an element of local. It wasn't about her, it was about the audience. Spot on.
Lucy was fantastic! She worked with us very collaboratively to tailor her session to our business. The feedback received was incredible.
I adore listening to Dr Lucy Hone, I couldn't take notes fast enough. In this modern world where our daily headspace can be our biggest enemy, her strategies for coping and silencing your inner critic are just fabulous. I plan to share her tips with my family and I hope our workplace gets her in for a session asap.
Lucy’s delivery was top notch, casual yet captivating. I cannot begin to say how amazing and engaging Lucy’s presentation was. I enjoyed every bit of it and would recommend Lucy to any group!
Dr Lucy was really personable and was able to tell her story and her lessons in simple terms which can be adapted to everyday life. Her session was relevant to each of us in the room and I'm sure people took home a few 'a-ha moments'.
