24 May 08:30-18:00 CESTKairos Future

Do you, like us, desire an inspiring vision of leadership anchored in the reality of these times?

Are you a leader in Swedish business, public sector or civil society, longing to co-create a more alive world? Do you dare to get your usual perspectives and frames challenged? Then this full-day conference is for you. We will cover the most burning questions in business, invite you to the inside of communities experimenting at the fringes, and give you a taste of cutting edge leadership practice – all the while giving you the opportunity to build relationships with fellow passionate leaders who also want to shape the future.

We are in a transformative era, experiencing what Kairos Future’s model for economic cycles defines as a societal winter. This period, characterized by wars, financial crises and declining faith in foundational institutions, marks a time of profound uncertainty and inevitable change. The current winter entails a transition from an industrial to a new societal model, which requires the invention of new approaches in leadership and organizing, as the old paradigms fail to address current problems. The Leading at the Edge conference will explore what such new approaches might be, inviting you to new frames for thinking and ways of being and doing. This full-day conference is hosted by Kairos Future and curated and led by Åsa Jonsson, future strategist at Kairos Future, and Fanny Norlin, thought- and practitioner leader in progressive leadership.

The full-day program will cover:

Discovering what meta-narratives are useful in the Internet age

We will delve into the history that has shaped our current society and business landscape, and provide an understanding of how technological advancements has been, and is, driving societal shifts. We will explore the emergence of new societal dynamics, and the impact of the shift from an industrial to an attention society.

Exploring leadership and organizational strategies in the age of digital decentralization

What new leadership and organizing perspectives, abilities and practices do we need to embrace to successfully navigate the era we are facing? By highlighting innovative case examples, we will challenge traditional organizational structures and leadership models, encouraging participants to think creatively about governance and collaboration in a landscape characterized by rapid change, increasing complexity and enmeshment of physical and digital worlds.

Embodying wise, vibrant, courageous leadership from the heart, in times of change

We will guide you through the cutting edge of leadership development, integrating concepts such as Somatic Leadership, Shadow Work and the balance of Masculine and Feminine Leadership principles. As disruptive technologies like AI reshape our world, we need to expand our uniquely human capacities related to creativity, collaboration and connection.

You will leave with

  • Insight into what the new paradigm will likely demand of organizations and leaders
  • Inspiration from organizations and leaders that experiment at the fringes of collaboration and leadership
  • Connections to other forward-leaning leaders who desire bolder, yet pragmatic, visions for the future of leadership and organizing
  • Embodied experiences of connecting to aliveness, heart and courage as a leader
  • Energy from thought-provoking discussions around the most potent questions for the future of leadership and organizing
  • Inspiration to co-build the future of business and civil society

This is for

  • Leaders in business, public sector and civil society seeking to navigate the complexities of the digital era with the intention to build a prospering future
  • You who yearn to go further than the regular leadership training; broadening horizons into the future and to encompass perspectives from philosophy, technology, spirituality and embodiment
  • Individuals drawn to the collective journey, who wants to be part of cultivating a network of pioneering thinkers and doers

The day consists of 5 seminars, about an hour each, during which the speakers will share perspectives and case examples as well as invite to exercises and experiences. There will also be space for questions, reflections, and discussions on how to apply these insights to your context. At the beginning and end of each seminar, hosts Åsa Jonsson and Fanny Norlin will provide continuity by weaving a cohesive thread that builds upon each session progressively.

Speakers and seminars

Alexander Bard
Capitalism versus Spirituality - The impossible but necessary combo for leadership and management in the digital era

This seminar will introduce a meta-narrative about the paradigm shift that we are currently in the midst of, which will provide a reference point for the rest of the seminar series. 


Alexander is a cyber philosopher who, together with Jan Söderqvist, has authored six books that present a novel view of historical progress through the lens of information technology. Alexander’s comprehensive understanding of what our digital future will look like has made him a key global voice on the future of management and leadership, and he regularly lectures and facilitates workshops on the topic at The Stockholm School of Economics.


In this seminar, Alexander will share his deep thoughts on the effects of the digital era, and what this will require from leadership and management. Can the unashamedly commercial motiefs of capitalism, as the logic of the paradigm we are leaving, be married to the spiritual aspects of attentionalism, the new paradigm’s logic? And which role does AI play in all of this? The seminar will provide you with a new frame of thinking about the times we are in, and an understanding of the foundational challenges that leaders and managers will face when leading their endeavors into the new paradigm.

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Lovisa Alsén
The Evolutionary Force of Eros & Feminine Leadership

Lovisa Alsén inadvertently initiated an international movement of sisterhood eight years ago with Awakening Feminine Leadership. Today hundreds of women business leaders in the world have taken her programs activating feminine leadership, while also co-creating and celebrating with men and the masculine. Built on the three embodied pillars of Pleasure, Power and Presence, activated by Eros, it has become an evolutionary force that has sparked a number of initiatives that keep building momentum.

In this immersive exploratory seminar, Lovisa will initiate by sharing her insights about this next level of leadership. You will learn how Eros can be galvanized to become an evolutionary force, and how it enables us to find unity in polarity, turning towards life, while supporting truth, authenticity and empowerment, individually and globally. You will then get a chance to explore and experience these concepts, discovering your own embodied truth.

With a rich background in entrepreneurship, business strategy and leadership coaching Lovisa has led diverse initiatives, including founding a VC-backed tech company and spearheaded re-creating the Swedish-American Chamber of Commerce into a creative hub in LA. For over 20 years, she has crafted programs merging business leadership with transformational mindfulness and spirituality practices in Silicon Valley, Hollywood and Sweden, incorporating teachings from Tantra, Shamanism, embodiment and energetics. She created Awakening Feminine Leadership upon returning to Sweden from the US in 2016.

You will leave this seminar with a juicy, alive and heartfelt vision of what is possible in business and in the world if we let Eros lead the way. The session is designed to not only expand your conceptual horizon but also to offer you a glimpse into the practical, embodied work that paves the way. By its conclusion, you'll find yourself feeling more connected, enthusiastic, and open-hearted about the potential for creating a thriving world guided by the evolutionary force of Eros, its principles and life-force itself.

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Tom Nixon
How to stay vision-focused in progressive organizations

In this seminar Tom will share key principles that are critical to be able to hold the central paradoxes of new paradigm businesses and staying on track to realise a purposeful vision in the world.


Tom Nixon has over 20 years experience on the rollercoaster ride of being a founder and is the author of the book "Work with Source” on the subject of why some visions come to life and others fizzle out. Today, he dedicates his expertise to supporting purpose-driven leaders, and advancing his open-source startup, Maptio.


Sharing the seminal thinker Peter Koenig’s decades of research, and his own experience of developing highly participatory initiatives, Tom Nixon will introduce you to a new perspective on how a vision and culture is held from the first founder onwards, and developing purposeful endeavors that can harness the creative potential of everyone involved. You will leave with more clarity on who is holding the vision of your current initiative, what might be getting in the way of progress, and how to organize and develop a culture that brings the vision to life.

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Mathias Gullbrandson
Thriving organisations in the engagement economy

Decentralized organizations based on distributed decision-making have proven themselves to be resource-effective and unleash the creative potential of their participants. Mathias has worked for 30 years as a management consultant and entrepreneur and will share a concrete example of a project that has embraced the principles of the new paradigm to heart and scaled to involve more than 20,000 people in the Nordic countries.

Mathias co-founded the service design and communication agency The Story Lab and the gamified project management platform Dreamler. Today, Mathias works with creating new structures for Burning Man’s global network of 80 local festivals and collaborates with biodynamic farms and ecological food companies to create a better food system.

In this seminar, Mathias will share his experiences from founding The Borderland Festival - one of the fastest-growing regional Burning Man events outside of the US. The Borderland is a completely self-organized participatory event where 4,000 people come together to build a temporary city. Built on the Burning Man principles of radical self-expression, self-reliance, inclusivity, communal effort, and Leave No Trace, the event provides a canvas for artists, performers, creatives, and participants from all walks of life to co-create an immersive, collaborative experience. With its vast distributed leadership operations, The Borderland serves as a fascinating blueprint for cutting-edge participatory leadership. Having followed Borderland from its inception 15 years ago, Mathias possesses a wealth of wisdom, insight, and experiences to share. Attendees of this seminar will leave inspired by a radical experiment that has pushed the limits of internet-enabled organizing.

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Fanny Norlin
Stories of feminine lifeforce and masculine integrity in the digital era

This seminar will present a framework for leadership that will help you unleash the creativity and power of both the masculine and the feminine leadership as well as understand why doing so is becoming ever more crucial for success. 


Fanny Norlin is pioneer in decentralized initiatives with 10 years of combined C-level leadership and strategy consulting experience. She is a leading voice in the European Feminine Leadership movement and a thought leader on progressive leadership, embodying the cutting edge of innovative management.


Fanny will introduce her Lifeforce Leadership framework, which explores the four core dimensions of feminine and masculine leadership. This seminar aims to deepen your understanding of these leadership dimensions and their critical importance in today's business world. Through real-life case studies and stories from companies and projects where leaders have successfully harnessed both feminine and masculine leadership, you will gain insights and approaches on how to foster deeper collaboration and unleash extraordinary creativity within your own initiative.

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All you need to know

Price: 10 000 sek (865 Euro) excluding VAT

30% Early bird discount for 10 first sign ups - early bird tickets sold out 


Location: Kairos Future's Office in Stockholm

Time: Official program 8.30-18:00, optional dinner thereafter. 

Refreshments: Lunch, coffee and dinner. 

© MapTiler © OpenStreetMap contributors

Led by

Åsa Jonsson
asa.jonsson@kairosfuture.com

Åsa Jonsson is a Future Strategist at Kairos Future, where she applies her multidisciplinary background from engineering and social psychology on youth research, the future of leadership and organizing and the future of commerce. Åsa is an appreciated agile team lead, has built self-managing organizations in the non-profit sector and is a passionate explorer at the fringes of organizational possibilities. At the London School of Economics, Åsa has researched how paradoxes in self-management can be navigated to create generative organizational dynamics. 

Fanny Norlin


Fanny Norlin lives and breathes decentralized initiatives, networks and technology. She has 10 years of combined C-level leadership and strategy consulting experience. During her time as CMO at Footway, they scaled from 6 to 24 markets and had 3x revenue growth in 3 years. 

The past five years Fanny has created a Leadership approach; “Lifeforce Leadership”, that is revolutionizing the field of network based/self-organizing organizations. She is a European leader of Feminine Leadership movement and a Deep Web thought leader on progressive leadership.