Biography

Carey Lohrenz is a dynamic communicator with an incredible story. As the first female F-14 Tomcat pilot, she was a pioneer in military aviation. Having flown missions worldwide as a combat, mission-ready United States Navy pilot, Carey Lohrenz is used to working in fast moving, dynamic environments where inconsistent execution can generate catastrophic results.

Carey is uniquely qualified in the fundamentals of winning under pressure, reducing errors and overcoming obstacles. Her mastery of these fundamentals can help your team triumph in this high-risk, time crunched world. Her experience in the all-male environment of fighter aviation and her ability to pass on the lessons learned in her career allow her to deliver insight and guidance from a credible platform.

As a high content keynote speaker, who is both motivational and inspirational, Carey Lohrenz inspires Fearless Leadership and increased team performance. Carey has been requested by name from some of the top Fortune 100 businesses. Her ability to connect with both an audience and on a one-on-one level, coupled with her knowledge and experience in leading high-performing, diverse teams, has made her highly sought after as a business consultant and leadership speaker.

Carey Lohrenz is the author of Fearless Leadership: High-Performance Lessons from the Flight Deck. She resides in Excelsior, MN and is currently working on her Masters in Business Administration in Strategic Leadership.

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Lessons in Partnership: The Leading Edge to Optimizing Relationships

Just like in aviation, in a rapidly changing global environment Speed is Life. Collaboration is critical to business success and Managing Successful Strategic Partnerships is crucial. Competitive advantage is gained when your organization can optimize partnerships and strategic alliances. Deeper relationships with partners can be the key to long term success and growth. In this inspiring and engaging keynote, Carey shares what it takes to be on the ‘Leading Edge’. Those things that helped her succeed in one of the most extreme environments on earth can help elevate your team, gain advantage and uncover opportunities.

Remaining Relevant

In a challenging economic environment, remaining relevant to your customers and within your organization is critical to your survival. Those who fail to deliver value to their consumers, shareholders, clients and teammates become extinct. Could that happen to you? In aviation, complacency kills. Same is true in business: if you become complacent and fail to ignore the warning signs (shifts in culture, trends, global demands, budget restrictions), you could be facing extinction. In this energizing and empowering keynote Carey shares the fundamentals that helped her win in the cockpit at Mach 2, and can help your team win in business; by learning the importance of remaining relevant, how to accelerate performance, how to stay agile and adaptable, and how high performing teams become excellent.

Striking A Balance

A successful career, a happy family, and a balanced personal life leave little time for many people to nurture their dreams. As a former Naval Aviator and corporate executive, and as a busy mother of four, Carey “Vixen” Lohrenz knows first-hand the challenges of navigating the many demands of daily work-life balance. In this riveting inspirational program, Carey will inspire you to be the catalyst and look beyond your circumstances. Just as pilots do a “systems check” before takeoff, Carey will walk you through a Pre-Flight Check on your journey towards success.

Belief in Yourself and Your Abilities: To be successful and ultimately take charge of your life, overcoming lack of self-belief is one of the biggest hurdles you need to overcome.

A Firm Commitment: Be unwavering and purposeful in your actions.

Clarity of Purpose: A clear picture of precisely what you want to achieve

Make a Plan to Stay Focused: Keep life’s distractions and interruptions at bay by creating your plan – and sticking to it.

This highly popular program will inspire and energize, while providing work-life balance tools to help audience members regain control of their personal and professional lives.

High Risk Into High Reward: Succeeding in High Pressure Environments

Carey Lohrenz knows what it takes to win in one of the highest pressure environments imaginable, where inconsistent execution can generate catastrophic results. When it comes to managing risk, carrier aviators have it down to a science. With zero tolerance for error, they rely on every crew member, regardless of rank, to work as a team. The key to establishing a culture of innovation is the ability to focus on what matters during times of change, to adapt and thrive. In this keynote, your attendees will learn how apply the standards of carrier aviation with tactical, high impact takeaways and next steps that they can apply immediately in their business.


Simple, rigorous checklists

A culture that doesn’t tolerate complacency

Sound critical decision making skills

Clear communication for transformation

A collaborative model to unlock potential

Lessons in Leadership: The 4 Fundamentals to Help you Win in Business & Life

Lessons in Leadership: The 4 Fundamentals to Help you Win in Business & Life

As the first female F-14 Fighter Pilot in the U.S.Navy, Carey Lohrenz knows what it takes to win in one of the highest pressure, extreme environments imaginable. In 1994, when Carey “Vixen” Lohrenz was deployed to the USS Abraham Lincoln, there were fewer than 5 female aviators on a ship of 5000 male crew members. Facing uncharted waters in an intensely male-dominated environment, Lohrenz learned vital lessons in leadership that followed her into the corporate world. The most successful leaders share a common foundation of principles used from the flight deck to the front office. The greatest leaders from all corners of the world know how to inspire, use good judgment, take initiative and make powerful decisions – with integrity. In this program, Carey shares the fundamentals that helped her win in the cockpit at Mach 2, and can help your team win in business:


Be a Catalyst: Make change happen by focusing on what matters most

Be Tenacious: Overcome your fear of failure

Be Committed to Excellence: Prepare, Perform and Prevail to accomplish seemingly impossible missions

every day

Be Resilient: Turn adversity into success

Patient Safety: 6 Risk Planning Strategies for Operational Excellence

Carey Lohrenz is a dynamic healthcare speaker whose passion for improving patient and staff satisfaction in the fast-paced field of healthcare brings results. With her authentic, highly motivational personality, she is in demand as a patient safety keynote speaker nationwide. Not only is she sought after by medical and pharmaceutical professionals for her risk management solutions, but small businesses and large corporations appreciate her “flight plan” for success. She will challenge, inform, and inspire your employees to higher levels of performance and operational excellence in high-risk and sometimes dangerous environments. Carey shares her leadership risk planning strategies and training to:


Improve leadership, communication, and teamwork among your physicians, nurses, staff and patients

Enhance the patient experience

Demonstrate simple root cause analysis that will highlight “what” is right, versus “who” is right

Create a positive safety culture

Reduce human error and the chance of a mishap

Encourage a commitment to safety from all of your healthcare providers, while maintaining clinical quality

These tools will allow your team to survive and succeed, with superior results consistently, just as Carey did in the demanding world of fighter aviation.

Testimonials

Carey was AMAZING! So much of what she said resonated with our organization. Her story is inspiring, her message applies to everyone, and her ability to engage the audience with a story is great! Additionally, she is a true professional, easy to work with, and fully committed to making sure the client has a good experience… Thank you!
– Kirk Guthrie, Executive Director of Talent Saatchi & Saatchi
After nearly a year of talking with Carey, last week I was able to arrange for her to speak at our company’s National Sales Meeting. Her ability to communicate and inspire a room full of corporate veterans was exceptional, extraordinary, prodigious, and first-class! As if it isn’t enough that Carey has a remarkable story of persistence with the U.S. Navy as an F-14 aviator, she is able to use those experiences to encourage and motivate others to achieve, recognizing there will be hurdles, but demonstrating that success is always within reach for those with the fortitude to chase their dreams. I would recommend Carey as a speaker to a wide variety of audiences – you’ll be happy you did.
– David Love, Director of Marketing Pathology Associates Medical Laboratories
An honor to meet Carey Lohrenz today at Dell World. I’m inspired by your story!
– Michael Dell, Founder and CEO of Dell
Vixen rocked! I just wanted to thank you for all you did to make our meeting inspiring and fantastic. I personally thought you did a great job connecting with everyone, and your story is inspiring, and your lessons very appropriate for all we are going through. Yesterday one of my VP’s was giving a presentation, and the title of it was ‘Lose sight, and you lose the fight’ And he gave you full credit for the quote!
– Dan Schulman, CEO of PayPal
Carey Lohrenz was great. She was so charming and her talk was incredibly on point. Her story resonated with the students, and she touched on the key points that we try to communicate to the students on a daily basis…that it takes a diverse team to accomplish a successful task, that there are lessons learned from failure, and finally lessons in tenacity and resilience. Now that she herself has a kid in college, she was really able to relate to the students.
– Monetta C. Edwards, CMP, Assistant Director of Winston Center for Leadership and Ethics, Boston College
Very nice to meet you and thanks for being part of our National Sales meeting. The feedback was terrific. Your presentation helped make our overall event a ‘huge’ success!
– Brien McMahon, Radian Executive Vice President & Chief Franchise Officer
Often I find myself to be the youngest and the only woman in the board room. Thank You! This was the session I was most looking forward to at Women’s Foodservice Forum 2013 and you exceeded my expectations! I am inspired and EMPOWERED!
– Lindsey Drake, Sales Training & Development Manager, Sysco Corporation

Booksby Carey Lohrenz

Span of Control: What to Do When You're Under Pressure, Overwhelmed, and Ready to Get What You Really Want

Fearless Leadership

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Blog Posts

 

Powerful Ways to Overcome Life’s Toughest Challenges with Merril Hoge

Ever wondered what it truly takes to face life’s most difficult challenges and emerge stronger,...

Read More

The Power of Optimism & Choosing to Focus Forward

Learn practical tips to help you cultivate optimism daily, plus insights on how optimism differs...

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How Events Are Shaping Experiences and Exceeding Expectations

Events are rapidly transforming from traditional gatherings into immersive experiences that captivate attendees. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j7TJEdYZDgc&list=PLXTlGHk63lLgbS8LN-PENXDzwMdqWAnOm With...

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The Power of Improvisation in an AI-Driven World

Why Improvisation is Essential in a Tech-Focused Era In an era where artificial intelligence is...

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What You Can Do to Overcome Your Insecurities

Understanding Insecurities and Their Impact on Leadership https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e9JD7cEZlfE&list=PLXTlGHk63lLgbS8LN-PENXDzwMdqWAnOm Insecurities affect how we present ourselves, especially...

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How to Teach Kids Accountability So They Can Thrive in Life

The Power of Teaching Accountability Through Leadership and Integrity https://youtu.be/Vn0nJwyDSHI As parents, we all want...

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