Peter Senge

Peter Senge has been at the forefront of organizational learning since publishing his classic text The Fifth Discipline in 1990, which provided theories and methods to foster aspiration, develop reflective conversation, and understand complexity in service of shaping learning-oriented organization cultures. In 1997, Harvard Business Review named the learning organization as one of “the seminal business ideas of the prior 75 years.”

Throughout his career, Peter has been asking, “how do we create the conditions for people to work together at their best, cultivating the innate systems intelligence that is our birthright but is all but lost in modern culture?” As an engineer by training, his work has always emphasized tools and methods, not for their own sake but as vehicles for building individual and collective capacities.

Starting with the creation of SoL (the Society of Organizational Learning) in 1997, he has focused on developing learning communities within and especially among organizations, as a way to bring about deep change that individual organizations are unable to achieve working alone. This resulted in the SoL Sustainability Consortium in 1998, pioneer businesses who saw social and ecological imbalances shaping the future, the Sustainable Food Lab in 2002, many of the world’s largest food companies and NGOs working together to make sustainable agriculture the mainstream system, and numerous learning communities in primary and secondary education, leading up to the present global Compassionate Systems community.

Peter graduated from Stanford University with a B.S. in engineering. He holds an M.S. in social systems modeling and a PhD in management from the MIT Sloan School of Management. His publications include The Fifth Discipline: The Art and Practice of the Learning Organization (1990), The Fifth Discipline Fieldbook (1994), The Dance of Change (1999), Schools that Learn: A Fifth Discipline Fieldbook for Educators, Parents, and Everyone Who Cares about Education (2000, 2010), Presence: Human Purpose and the Field of the Future (2004, 2008), and The Necessary Revolution: How Individuals and Organizations Are Working Together to Create a Sustainable World (2008).

Otto Scharmer

Otto Scharmer is a Senior Lecturer in the MIT Sloan School of Management and co-founder of the Presencing Institute. He chairs the MIT IDEAS program for cross-sector innovation and introduced the concept of “presencing”—learning from the emerging future—in his bestselling books Theory U and Presence (the latter co-authored with Peter Senge and others). His most recent book, The Essentials of Theory U, summarizes the core principles and applications of awareness-based systems change.

In 2015, he co-founded the MITx u.lab and in 2020 the GAIA journey (Global Activation of Intention and Action), both of which promote a worldwide ecosystem of transformational change. Most recently, he and United Nations colleagues co-hosted the Global Dialogues on Transforming Systems. With his colleagues he co-created the Action Learning Lab for change makers across UN agencies, as well as a set of SDG Leadership Labs that build capacity for leading transformational change.

Otto earned PhD in economics from Witten/Herdecke University in Germany. He is a member of the UN Learning Advisory Council for the 2030 Agenda, the World Future Council, and the Club of Rome’s High-Level 21st Century Transformational Economics Commission. He has won the Jamieson Prize for Teaching Excellence at MIT and the European Leonardo Corporate Learning Award. In 2021 he received the Elevating Humanity Award from the Organizational Development Network.

Jean Houston

The Chancellor of Meridian University, Dr. Houston is a visionary researcher who has authored over 40 books and worked intensively in even more cultures, lectured in over 100 countries, and worked with major organizations such as UNICEF and NASA. She has been an advisor to numerous world leaders, and the past international consultant for the United Nations. Dr. Houston's book, A Passion for the Possible, was an expansive compliment to her inspiring PBS special of the same name. Dr. Houston has served on the faculties of Columbia University, Hunter College, Marymount College, The New School for Social Research, and the University of California. She holds doctoral degrees in both psychology and religion.

Riane Eisler

Riane Eisler, JD, PhD (hon), is internationally known as a systems scientist, cultural historian, futurist, and attorney. She is president of the Center for Partnership Systems (CPS) and Editor-in-Chief of the Interdisciplinary Journal of Partnership Studies at the University of Minnesota. Dr. Eisler pioneered the expansion of human rights theory and action to include women and children, and her research, writing, and speaking has transformed the lives of people worldwide. She keynotes conferences internationally and consults for governments on Partnerism and the Partnership model. She is the author of numerous books, including Nurturing Our Humanity: How Domination and Partnership Shape Our Brains, Lives and Future (Oxford University Press, 2019) and The Chalice and The Blade: Our History, Our Future (now in its 57th US printing, and in 27 foreign language editions). Her The Real Wealth of Nations: Creating a Caring Economics was hailed by Nobel Peace Laureate Archbishop Desmond Tutu as "a template for the better world we have been so urgently seeking" and inspired the development of CPS’s Social Wealth Index, showing the economic return from investing in caring for people, starting at birth, and caring for our natural life-support systems. For more information see www.centerforpartnership.org, www.partnerism.org, & www.rianeeisler.com

Anneloes Smitsman

​Dr. Anneloes Smitsman, PhD, LLM, is a visionary scientist, futurist, system architect, and leadership catalyst for the transition to a Thrivable Civilization. She is the Founder and CEO of EARTHwise Centre. She is the co-author of the #1 Amazon Bestseller “The Quest of Rose,” the first book of the “Future Humans Trilogy” with Dr. Jean Houston, and is the author of the Amazon Bestseller “Love Letters from Mother Earth – The Promise of a New Beginning”, as well as many scientific articles and chapters in international peer-reviewed journals and books. She is the lead author of the r3.0 Educational Transformation Blueprint, as well as the lead architect of the SEEDS Constitution, and an architect and researcher of Hypha for co-developing the Regenerative Renaissance tools, currencies, systems, and cultures. Her unique transformation programs and practices have empowered thousands of people and organizations from around the world.

Website - https://www.earthwisecentre.org/anneloes-smitsman

Kazuma Matoba

Kazuma was born in Kobe/Japan and studied Linguistics and International Politics at Sophia University in Tokyo. After his PhD study in Germany he has taught and researched at several Universities in Japan and Germany. Since 2018 he is Professor for intercultural education at Witten/Herdecke University in Germany. He is co-founder of Institute for Global Integral Competence (www.ifgic.org), managing director of Academy of Inner Science Graduate Program and Master of Arts in Inner Science at Ubiquity University. One of his research topics is “Global Social Witnessing”.

Melissa Schwartz

Melissa Schwartz, PhD is the Chief Academic Officer at Meridian University where she guides integrally-oriented programs in Education, Business, and Psychology. The Director of Meridian’s Center for Transformative Learning, Melissa is dually licensed as both a psychologist and as a Marriage and Family Therapist (MFT). She serves as a reviewer for the American Psychological Association’s Journal, Psychology of Women Quarterly, and the California Psychological Association’s Office of Professional Development. As well, she serves as a Subject Matter Expert for California’s Board of Behavioral Sciences in the continual development of the state’s MFT licensure examination. Melissa’s research interests are in the areas of adult development, the psychology of women, integral transformative assessment, and the role of culture in transformative learning.