November 2020
Vol 7 | Issue 351

Q&A with Lara Stein of Boma Global

CEO & Co-founder

Principal Series:

Boma is a global network of local partners committed to empowering people and organizations to be more intentional and intelligent about the future. Boma Global provides extraordinary training programs for executives and leaders, based on content and insights from the world’s leading thinkers and doers. We leverage our international talent and deep curatorial expertise to create powerful curriculum for our global network of independent partners (we have 9 Country Partners on board so far). Our curriculum focuses around ‘what you need to know’ and ‘who you need to be’ to lead courageously and responsibly through this chaotic time and into the future.

Boma’s four founding partners have over 50 years of collective experience in experiential learning and community building, scaling global networks such as TEDx and Singularity University. Our expertise in experience design and curation, combined with our international speaker talent and the cutting-edge insights of our Global Brain Trust, make us uniquely positioned to succeed as a leader in training content development and delivery.

Our ambition is to produce the leaders the world needs: people who combine technical sophistication with the personal courage and integrity to lead us into a better tomorrow.

Join us for a private Family Office Insights Webinar/Teleconference featuring Boma Global, a leading global network disrupting executive leadership training and transformational learning experiences.

December 2, 2020 12:30-1:30 PM EST  RSVP HERE

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Family Office Insights is a voluntary, “opt-in” collaborative peer-to-peer community of single family offices, qualified investors and institutional investors. Join the community here www.familyofficeinsights.com


What problem are you addressing, and how are proposing to solve it?

Why Now?

We live in a time of radical change and unprecedented complexity. The tide has turned on climate change; our systems and global supply chains are failing us; the pandemic is forcing a change in priorities and workplace dynamics; whole industries are being wiped out by automation; geopolitical tensions and trade wars threaten global markets.

The demands on our leaders have never been greater—and their expectations have never been higher. Yet, most corporate training is based on decades-old frameworks and traditional styles of delivery. Just 8% of CEOs see business impact from their current training programs - even less (4%) see ROI. A new framework of sustainable leadership is needed to navigate complexity and succeed in the face of structural, economic and technological uncertainty. That is why we created Boma.

Why Boma?

Boma is a global network of local partners that empower people and organizations to shape a more intentional and intelligent future. We do this by creating transformational learning experiences, custom leadership programs, and interactive events around the world — both in-person and online — based on the content and insights from the world’s leading thinkers and doers. We are disrupting the outdated corporate training model, delivering cutting-edge and constantly evolving curriculum focused on ‘what you need to know’ and ‘who you need to be’ to lead courageously and intelligently through this chaotic time, and into the future. Our holistic and sustainable leadership training empowers people and organizations to navigate disruption, and think differently about the world we have, and the world we want to create.

What makes our team the right group to address this issue?

Founding Team

Boma’s four founding partners have over 50 years of collective experience in experiential learning and community building, scaling global networks such as TEDx and Singularity University.

Kaila Colbin founded and successfully exited project management training company, Falcon Training. She is a Certified Dare to Lead™ Facilitator who trained with Brené Brown, a certified ExO consultant, a Climate Project Ambassador who trained with Al Gore, as well as an acclaimed public speaker and instructor sought after by corporations and groups like YPO.

Lara Stein created TEDx for TED, was the Executive Director of the Women's Global March and led Singularity University’s global expansion. Arguably the world's best at creating community and most connected to the world's global learning ecosystems, Lara is a master of scale.

To build Boma, Lara and Kaila joined forces with Michel Lévy Provençal (Founder of TEDx in France and Co-Founder of Rue89, Brightness & L’Échappée Volée), and Stephan Balzer (Founder of Red Onion in Berlin and launched TEDx and Singularity University in Germany).

Boma is More of a Roll Up, Than a Startup

Upon inception, Boma had 4.5K+ speaker relationships, multiple active corporate
educational programs, and a series of planned events. Boma opened with revenues in 3 countries, rolling up operational organizations in France, New Zealand, and Germany who are actively generating $2-$3M in revenue annually, of which Boma receives an incrementally-growing rev share. 6 countries have since been added — including China, Chile, Brazil, India, USA, and Poland — with 10 country partners slated for 2021.

Each of our eight country partners have extended communities and speaker relationships, as well as a proven track-record in experiential learning and leadership. Boma also has dozens of corporate, impact and community partners, who work with Boma due to their shared passion for collaboration and making this world more ethical, sustainable and human-centered. Lastly, Boma’s Global Brain Trust comprises 48 (and growing) of the world’s leading thinkers and doers to advise and inform our global thought leadership curriculum, curation, and content in real time.

How is our approach different from other similar efforts?

Superior Global Access to Talent

To be the frontrunner in leadership training, a company needs to have the most creative and cutting-edge content sourced by leading experts, creatives and innovators. A company with this access, in essence, has an unfair competitive advantage. Boma’s extensive global network, developed by Lara Stein and her colleagues, through their experiences with TEDX, Singularity University and other entities, sets Boma far ahead of the competition and creates this advantage. Boma’s ability to source, identify, curate and scale the world’s best thinkers, doers, ideas and innovations, and introduce them into organizations, positions Boma to be the leader in training content development and delivery.

We are Future-Proofing Organizations

CEOs have shifted from record optimism to record pessimism over the past two years. Such uncertainty is not only affecting the global economy - it is transforming corporate purpose. While traditional corporate training delivers the skills for the jobs of today, Boma focuses on facing the challenges of tomorrow. Boma equips leaders with what they need to know (skills) and who they need to be (muscle) to navigate uncertainty and lead responsibly into the future. We offer a sustainable and holistic approach to leadership development that gives leaders the tools and frameworks to better understand vectors of change, and anticipate future disruptions and transformation opportunities.

An Experiential Approach to Leadership Training

We bring an “experiential” background to typically staid events and corporate training, resulting in programming which is 1. deeply local but informed by what’s happening globally, 2. cutting-edge with insights from global experts, and 3. holistic - merging external knowledge with internal values-based development. We work with international experts in science, technology, ethics and the arts to guide custom workshops and participatory learning experience. It’s all delivered with the rabid attention to pedagogy and the experience design necessary to create massive impact.

Deeply Local & Global Perspective

Lasting solutions and new protocols cannot be discussed in silos, but rather require a global conversation of experts of many viewpoints and backgrounds. At Boma, we take a proactive approach to address the most pressing challenges of our time by galvanizing action initiatives designed to sustain change at the local, regional, national, and international levels. Boma is set apart from other efforts because we combine the best in global thinking with the best in local insights to create cutting-edge, hyper relevant, and continually evolving programming.


Lara Stein of Boma Global

Lara Stein is the Co-Founder and CEO of Boma Global, a global network of local partners offering transformational learning experiences to help us be more intentional and intelligent about the future we’re creating. Prior to founding Boma, Lara was the Executive Director of Women’s March Global, where she built the Women’s March Global platform and oversaw all Women’s March initiatives outside of the US. Previously Ms. Stein was MD Global Development at Singularity University, responsible for Singularity University’s global expansion and implementation of vision and strategy. Prior to her time at SU, Lara was the founder and director of the TEDx program at the TED Conferences, creating and leading the effort to bring TED to the world by developing a program that granted free licenses to third parties to organize independent TED-like events. Stein also currently sits on the board of Equality Now, dedicated to creating a more just world for women and girls and Lalela, a non-profit dedicated to education through the arts in South Africa. Contact Lara: 

lara@boma.global