Levison Wood
Most leadership advice assumes a stable operating environment that is no longer reliably available. Teams are being asked to make consequential decisions with incomplete information, in conditions that change faster than the planning cycle, and on terrain no one in the room has crossed before. The question is no longer how to optimise a known route. It is how to keep a team moving, intact and clear-headed when the route itself keeps shifting.
Levison Wood is an explorer, former Parachute Regiment officer and bestselling author who helps organisations think harder about leadership, risk and team behaviour under sustained uncertainty.
Full Profile
Why organisations work with Levison Wood
- He has tested leadership and team principles under conditions where failure has a real cost, including a 4,250-mile walk along the Nile and a circumnavigation of the Arabian Peninsula through Iraq, Yemen and Saudi Arabia.
- His military background as a Parachute Regiment captain in Afghanistan gives him a working framework for decision-making under pressure that translates cleanly into commercial settings.
- “The Art of Exploration” sets out a usable structure on curiosity, resilience and team behaviour that boards and senior teams can apply, rather than a set of war stories.
- He brings a credible outside perspective on geopolitics and operating in unfamiliar environments, drawn from on-the-ground work in regions most leaders only read about.
- Bureau-listed clients including Bosch, Nokia, Diageo, Bank of America and Virgin indicate a track record with senior commercial audiences rather than only event circuits.
Biography highlights
- Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society, Fellow of the Explorers Club, Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts.
- Chancellor of Staffordshire University, installed May 2024.
- Honorary doctorates from Staffordshire University and the University of Nottingham.
- Author of bestselling titles including “Walking the Nile”, “Walking the Himalayas”, “Arabia”, “The Last Giants” and “The Art of Exploration”.
- “Walking the Himalayas” named Adventure Travel Book of the Year at the 2016 Edward Stanford Travel Writing Awards.
- Producer and presenter of major documentary series for Channel 4, including “Walking the Nile”, “Walking the Himalayas”, “Walking the Americas” and “Arabia with Levison Wood”.
Biography
The first ever expedition to walk the length of the Nile began in December 2013, in the Nyungwe Forest in Rwanda, and finished nine months and 4,250 miles later in the Mediterranean. The walker was Levison Wood, a former Parachute Regiment captain who had served in Helmand, Kandahar and Zabul, and who had decided that exploration was a more honest test of the same disciplines.
What separates his work from adventure storytelling is the operating logic underneath it. Walking through Iraq, Yemen, Syria, the Empty Quarter and the Darien Gap forces specific decisions about risk, team composition, local intelligence and when to abandon a plan. Those decisions are recognisable to anyone running a complex programme in a volatile environment.
He has put the framework on paper. “The Art of Exploration”, published in 2021, sets out how curiosity, resilience and small-team discipline operate when the route is unknown, and is the basis of his keynote of the same name. His other books, including “Walking the Himalayas”, which won the Edward Stanford Adventure Travel Book of the Year in 2016, and “Arabia”, treat the expeditions as case material rather than autobiography.
The institutions have followed. He is a Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society, a Fellow of the Explorers Club, holds honorary doctorates from Staffordshire University and the University of Nottingham, and was installed as Chancellor of Staffordshire University in May 2024. Senior corporate audiences at Bosch, Nokia, Diageo, Bank of America and Virgin have booked the same body of work.
Key speaking topics
- Leadership under uncertainty
- Decision-making in complex environments
- Team performance and small-team discipline
- Resilience and recovery from setback
- Risk assessment and mitigation
- Curiosity as a leadership practice
- Geopolitics and operating in unfamiliar regions
Ideal for
- CEOs and executive teams setting strategy in volatile or unfamiliar markets.
- Operations, transformation and programme leaders responsible for delivery under shifting conditions.
- Leadership development audiences in financial services, industrials and consumer businesses.
- Boards and senior offsites looking for an outside perspective on risk and decision-making.
Audience outcomes
- A working sense of how experienced operators make decisions when information is incomplete and the environment keeps moving.
- Specific examples of how small teams hold together under sustained pressure, drawn from named expeditions across the Nile, the Himalayas and the Arabian Peninsula.
- A sharper view of how to identify, weigh and live with material risk rather than try to remove it.
- A reframed sense of curiosity and adaptability as operational disciplines, not personality traits.
- A vocabulary for talking about resilience that does not collapse into motivational language.
Talks
A keynote drawn from Wood’s book of the same name, treating exploration as a working model for leadership, team behaviour and decision-making under pressure.
Key takeaways:
- How small teams maintain cohesion and judgement when conditions deteriorate.
- A practical framing of risk, preparation and adaptation that translates from expedition to organisation.
- How curiosity functions as an operational discipline rather than a personal trait, with examples from named expeditions across the Nile, the Himalayas and the Arabian Peninsula.
Videos
Testimonials
Books
Fees
| EUR | GBP | USD | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Home Country | €12000 to €40000 | £10,001 - £35,000 | $15000 - $50000 |
| Asia Pacific | €12000 to €40000 | £10,001 - £35,000 | $15000 - $50000 |
| Europe | €12000 to €40000 | £10,001 - £35,000 | $15000 - $50000 |
| Middle East & Africa | €12000 to €40000 | £10,001 - £35,000 | $15000 - $50000 |
| South America | €12000 to €40000 | £10,001 - £35,000 | $15000 - $50000 |
| United Kingdom | €12000 to €40000 | £10,001 - £35,000 | $15000 - $50000 |
| US East Coast | €12000 to €40000 | £10,001 - £35,000 | $15000 - $50000 |
| US West Coast | €12000 to €40000 | £10,001 - £35,000 | $15000 - $50000 |
| Virtual | Please enquire | Please enquire | Please enquire |