Gerry Valentine
About Gerry Valentine
Gerry Valentine inspires people to build resilience—to overcome setbacks, to look at challenges in new ways, and to turn adversity into a source of advantage. Gerry is a public speaker, executive coach, and business advisor with more than 25 years of experience as a Fortune 100 leader. As the founder of Vision Executive Coaching, he is a trusted advisor to corporate executives, business leaders, and entrepreneurs. Gerry specializes in teaching them how to use setbacks as a teacher; how to unlock creativity, imagination, and innovation; and how to use the best within oneself to inspire the very best in others.
Gerry built a career with some of the world’s most respected firms, including American Express and Pfizer, where he led multi-million-dollar lines of business. But this was an unlikely path. Gerry’s early life was spent in poverty, as the child of a single mother in a low-income part of New York City. He went on to earn a BS in Engineering from Cornell University and an MBA from the New York University Stern School of Management. Along the way, Gerry found that the adversity of his youth helped him develop the resilience he needed to succeed in the corporate world and that building resilience is a skill he can teach others.
Today, Gerry gives keynote talks and workshops across the country on building resilience, leading during difficult times, and finding strategic solutions to challenges. He is a TEDx speaker and a contributor to Forbes.com. Gerry has also lectured on executive leadership at Columbia University, Baruch College, and Colorado State University.
Gerry divides his time between New York City and New Paltz, New York—a picturesque town on the Hudson River Valley. He’s an outdoor enthusiast who enjoys running, cycling, hiking, and skiing. Gerry has also completed eight Ironman Triathlons, five marathons, and many shorter-distance events
The Thriving Mindset: Tools for Empowerment in a Disruptive World
We’re living through the most disruptive time in human history and people are struggling to adapt.
The pace and scale of new technologies, globalization, and cultural shifts are changing how we live, work, and even how we relate to each other. The coronavirus pandemic has added more fuel to the fire. How do we move forward? How can you not just survive but thrive in this unsettling new world?
Here’s what most people don’t know: many of the world’s greatest achievements are, in fact, the result of some type of disruption. In The Thriving Mindset: Tools for Empowerment in a Disruptive World, Gerry Valentine offers a hands-on guide to turn the disruption of today’s world to your advantage. He offers proven tools to build resilience, harness your fears, and develop the skills and daily practices that can unlock opportunity.
Drawing upon his extensive experience as a Fortune 100 leader, executive coach, and trusted business advisor, Valentine shares case studies, inspiring personal stories, and valuable lessons learned from the people most successful in the face of disruption. He describes 11 specific principles to cultivate a Thriving Mindset and to successfully navigate any kind of personal or professional change.
Whether you’re a business leader, an entrepreneur, a professional facing career uncertainty, or anyone who wants to live their best life, Valentine shows you how to build the specific skills you need to succeed.
There’s never been a better time for a book like this one that shows you how to navigate these unprecedented times and transform adversity into opportunity.
Buy The Thriving Mindset:
What People Are Saying
What People Are Saying
I met Gerry Valentine many years ago when we worked together at Pfizer Pharmaceuticals. I was always impressed with the integrity of his leadership style, so I was delighted when he launched his executive coaching business. I knew he would bring that same integrity to his clients. I was even more delighted when he published a book, The Thriving Mindset--Tools for Empowerment in a Disruptive World, because it was the next step in delivering that integrity, and at a time when we need it more than ever. Two important values I live by in my own life are be your authentic self in every aspect of your life and to whom much is given, much will be required. Gerry exemplifies those values in his book. By sharing authentic stories from his personal and professional journey—both the triumphs and the setbacks—Gerry provides an essential guide for anyone looking to overcome disruption and challenges (things we will all face), or allowing them to find, as Gerry puts it, the advantage that is often just on the other side of the adversity.
Authenticity and empowerment from within are central to every lesson Gerry Valentine teaches, especially in The Thriving Mindset - Tools for Empowerment in a Disruptive World. Through a wide array of easily digestible narratives and studies, Mr. Valentine has crafted an essential guide that can help everyone, from startup to C-Suite, that leverage lessons learned from disruption to achieve new success.
I am Odell Mays, Principal and Founder of Mays2 Consulting, a specialized practice working with nonprofits on organizational sustainability issues. I am also an adjunct faculty at Columbia University. Gerry and I met in 1986 at NYU Graduate School of Business, and we have remained close friends and confidantes ever since. Gerry has an amazing, prescient ability to make connections between life events and life actions. His clear-headed, and analytical mindset really defines the concept of thriving, and he shares that mindset in a most generous way. I have had the privilege of watching Gerry embrace and embody the ideas set forth in this well-written, accessible, practical book. More than ever, we need authors and speakers who can help us make sense and make a plan for thriving during these disruptive and difficult times. This book is a must-read!
