Nina Jensen
Nina Jensen is the CEO of REV Ocean and is a tireless champion for promoting environmentally responsible solutions for the world's ocean. She started this position in 2018 after 15 years of positive impact in WWF-Norway (as Secretary-General since 2012). Nina holds a Master’s degree in Marine Biology from the University of Fishery Science in Tromsø, and has a background in communications and marketing from Ogilvy & Mather. Nina is a board member of The Business for Peace Foundation, The Technology for Ocean (C4IR Ocean) Foundation, The Brain Tumour Association, Ocean Wise, Aker Offshore Wind, Aker CarbonCapture and Project Energy PER-A. She was named Young Global Leader by the World Economic Forum in 2014. She is also on the Executive Board of Norway’s Polytechnic Society, and part of Friends of Ocean Action and an advisor to the High-Level Panel for a Sustainable Ocean Economy.
3 words to describe Nature?
Life. Support. System
3 things Nature taught you?
What makes life worth living
Nature always finds a way
Human nature is the most destructive force of nature
3 most treasured Nature spots?
Lofoten islands
Sipadan Island
Madagascar
When you look at the OCEAN, it makes you feel...?
Happy
When you see a FOREST, it makes you feel...?
Relaxed
When you see a VOLCANO, it makes you feel...?
Excited
When you see a SUNRISE or SUNSET, it makes you feel...?
At peace
When you hear THUNDER, it makes you feel...?
Alive
When you hear the WIND HOWLING, it makes you feel...?
Small
Are you an Ocean, Mountain, Forest, or Desert person?
Ocean😊
On a scale of 1 to 10, how important is Nature to your well-being?
10
Share with us a childhood nature memory?
My favourite childhood activity was swimming and snorkelling in the kelp forest, exploring the amazing beauty and wonders of our ocean and always discovering something new. It was a very welcome escape from the hectic city life in Oslo, where I grew up.
Eric Whitacre
Grammy Award-winning composer and conductor, Eric Whitacre, is among today’s most popular musicians. His works are programmed worldwide and his ground-breaking Virtual Choirs have united singers from more than 145 countries. Born in Nevada in 1970, Eric is a graduate of the prestigious Juilliard School of Music (New York). He completed his second and final term as Artist in Residence with the Los Angeles Master Chorale in 2020 following five years as Composer in Residence at the University of Cambridge (UK).
His compositions have been widely recorded and his debut album as a conductor on Universal, Light, and Gold, went straight to the top of the charts, earning him a Grammy. As a guest conductor, he has drawn capacity audiences to concerts with many of the world’s leading orchestras and choirs in venues such as Carnegie Hall (New York), Walt Disney Concert Hall (Los Angeles), the Royal Albert Hall, and Buckingham Palace (London). Insatiably curious and a lover of all types of music, Eric has worked with legendary Hollywood composers Hans Zimmer, John Powell, and Jeff Beal as well as British pop icons Laura Mvula, Imogen Heap, and Annie Lennox. Major classical commissions have been written for the BBC Proms, Minnesota Orchestra, Rundfunkchor Berlin, The Tallis Scholars, Chanticleer, Cincinnati Pops, Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, National Children’s Chorus of America, and The King’s Singers.
In 2018 his composition for symphony orchestra and chorus, Deep Field, became the foundation for a collaboration with NASA, the Space Telescope Science Institute, Music Productions, and 59 Productions. The film was premiered at Kennedy Space Center (Cape Canaveral, Florida), has been seen at arts and science festivals across the world. Deep Field has been performed in concert on several continents, and with simultaneous film projection by the New World Symphony, New World Center (Miami), Brussels Philharmonic, Flagey (Brussels), Bergen Philharmonic, Grieghallen (Bergen) among other great orchestras. His long-form work for choir, cello, and piano, The Sacred Veil, is a profound meditation on love, life, and loss. It was premiered by the Los Angeles Master Chorale in Walt Disney Concert Hall in 2019, conducted by the composer, and will be released on Signum Records in 2020.
Widely considered to be the pioneer of Virtual Choirs, Eric created his first project as an experiment in social media and digital technology. Virtual Choir 1: Lux Aurumque was published in 2010 and featured 185 singers from 12 countries. Ten years-on in 2020, Virtual Choir 6: Sing Gently – written for the Virtual Choir during the global pandemic that shook the world, COVID-19 – featured 17,562 singers from 129 countries. Previous Virtual Choir projects include ‘Glow’ written for the Winter Dreams holiday show at Disneyland© Adventure Park, California, and the Virtual Youth Choir, a major fundraiser for UNICEF. To date, the Virtual Choirs have registered over 60 million views and have been seen on global TV.
A charismatic speaker, Eric Whitacre has given keynote addresses for many Fortune 500 companies, in education and global institutions from Apple and Google to the World Economic Forum in Davos and the United Nations Speaker’s Program. His mainstage talks at the influential TED conference in Long Beach CA received standing ovations. His collaboration with Spitfire Audio resulted in a trail-blazing vocal sample library, became an instant best-seller, and is used by composers the world over.
3 words to describe Nature?
Breathe. Connected. Right.
3 things Nature taught you?
Patience
Focus
Inevitability
3 most treasured Nature spots?
The high desert in Northern Nevada
Regent’s Park, London
Big Sur, California
When you look at the ocean, it makes you feel...?
Open and alive
When you see a forest, it makes you feel...?
Ancient, quiet
When you see a volcano, it makes you feel...?
Elemental
When you see a sunrise or sunset, it makes you feel...?
How small I truly am, and how vast is our universe
When you hear thunder, it makes you feel...?
Young
When you hear the wind howling, it makes you feel...?
Lonely
Are you an Ocean, Mountain, Forest, or Desert person?
Yes! I think I have all four of those places deep in my heart.
On a scale of 1 to 10, how important is Nature to your well-being?
10
Share with us a childhood nature memory?
When I was young I lived in the desert. Northern Nevada, high in the Sierras, my childhood filled with endless sky. I would spend my days outside, the natural world vibrating all around me, mystical, magical. I believed I could speak to falcons. I believed I could shape the wind. And I believed the veil between the real world and the dream world was just an illusion, that if I quieted myself enough I could slip freely between the two worlds. I think I still believe that.
Kirstine Stewart
Kirstine Stewart is the Head of Shaping the Future of Media and a Member of the Executive Committee at the World Economic Forum where she leads a team working with the CEOs, Chairs and other CSuite execs from more than 40 major global media companies including Google, Facebook, Tencent, NBCU, Bytedance and more. The team works with these media leaders to keep the industry on the leading edge in a disrupted marketplace.
Kirstine first worked at the intersection of tech and media when she led the Media and Content Teams as VP North America for Twitter, transitioning after she built the fastest-growing Twitter ad sales office in the world, located in Canada. As VP Media in New York, Kirstine led teams driving content creation and business partnerships in News and Government, Entertainment, Music, and Sports.
Before moving to Twitter, Kirstine was the Head of Canada’s national broadcaster the CBC. She is credited with reviving the public broadcaster by introducing such hit shows as Dragons’ Den, Murdoch Mysteries, Heartland, and more, expanding CBC’s reach across TV and Radio and taking the Corp through a major digital transformation marked by the 2014 Olympics.
Over her career, Kirstine held series of executive positions in Canada, and the US focused on the global expansion of US brands including leading Canada’s HGTV and Food network and management and programming 37 international channels for Hallmark with offices in Denver, Hong Kong, New York, and LA.
Prior to her work at the Forum, Kirstine held C-suite positions at two successful tech startups, the most recent being digital transformation company TribalScale working with John Hancock and Emirates among other international Fortune 1000 companies. She has served on a number of public, private, and nonprofit boards and advisories including TheScore, WOW (Creators of Castlevania) PSP Investments, and Ryerson University’s DMZ.
Kirstine is also the author of the bestselling leadership book published by Random House “Our Turn”.
3 words to describe Nature?
Overwhelming. Beautiful. Respect
3 things Nature taught you?
That there are literally things bigger than yourself.
That humans are not in control.
But that humans can do damage on a horrendous scale.
3 most treasured Nature spots?
The pitons of St Lucia
The Niagara escarpment
The Colorado Rockies
When you look at the ocean, it makes you feel...?
Calm
When you see a forest, it makes you feel...?
Inquisitive
When you see a volcano, it makes you feel...?
Trembling
When you see a sunrise or sunset, it makes you feel...?
Alive
When you hear thunder, it makes you feel...?
Guttural
When you hear the wind howling, it makes you feel...?
Displaced
Are you an Ocean, Mountain, Forest, or Desert person?
Lake & river
On a scale of 1 to 10, how important is Nature to your well-being?
10
Share with us a childhood nature memory?
Falling in the 16mile creek catching crawfish at school
Yancey Strickler
Yancey Strickler is a writer and entrepreneur. He is the cofounder and former CEO of Kickstarter, author of This Could Be Our Future: A Manifesto for a More Generous World, and the creator of Bentoism. Yancey has been recognized as a Young Global Leader by the World Economic Forum and one of Fast Company’s Most Creative People. He cofounded the artist resource The Creative Independent and the record label eMusic Selects. Yancey grew up in Clover Hollow, Virginia, and began his career as a music critic in New York City. The London Spectator called him "one of the least obnoxious tech evangelists ever."
3 words to describe Nature?
Shhhwwwwwwww (wind through the trees)
tckltckltckltckltckl (leaves on the ground)
grglgrglgrglgrgl (water falling from a rocky cave)
3 things Nature taught you?
How to hide
What it means to be healthy
The upside of death
3 most treasured Nature spots?
Canopied forests with pine needles on the ground
Any beach
The farm where I grew up
When you look at the ocean, it makes you feel...?
Infinite
When you see a forest, it makes you feel...?
Taller
When you see a volcano, it makes you feel...?
Side-eyed
When you see a sunrise or sunset, it makes you feel...?
Like a George Harrison song
When you hear thunder, it makes you feel...?
Five years old
When you hear the wind howling, it makes you feel...?
Small
Are you an Ocean, Mountain, Forest, or Desert person?
E) All of the above
On a scale of 1 to 10, how important is Nature to your well-being?
10
Share with us a childhood nature memory?
Age twelve waiting for the bus when a deer, wounded by a hunter's bullet, came staggering out of the woods and collapsed across the street from me. I stayed with it and spoke with it until its eyes went blank.
Enric Sala
photo credit Manu San Félix
Dr. Enric Sala is a National Geographic Explorer-in-Residence dedicated to restoring the health and productivity of the ocean. His more than 120 scientific publications are widely recognized and used for real-world conservation efforts such as the creation of marine reserves. Enric is currently working to help protect the last pristine marine ecosystems worldwide, and to develop new business models for marine conservation. He founded and leads National Geographic’s Pristine Seas, a project that combines exploration, research, and media to inspire country leaders to protect the last wild places in the ocean. To date, Pristine Seas has helped to create 13 of the largest marine reserves on the planet, covering an area of over 4.5 million square kilometers.
Enric has received many awards including 2008 Young Global Leader by the World Economic Forum, 2013 Research Award from the Spanish Geographical Society, 2013 Lowell Thomas Award from the Explorers Club, and a 2013 Hero Award from the Environmental Media Association. He is a fellow of the Royal Geographical Society. Enric’s experience and scientific expertise contributes to his service on advisory boards of international organizations and governments.
3 words to describe Nature?
Life. Support. System
3 things Nature taught you?
Magic
Wonder
Purpose
3 most treasured Nature spots?
Millennium Atoll (Kiribati)
Volcanoes National Park (Rwanda)
Any ancient forest
When you look at the ocean, it makes you feel...?
Infinite
When you see a forest, it makes you feel...?
Blessed
When you see a volcano, it makes you feel...?
Amazed
When you see a sunrise or sunset, it makes you feel...?
Alive
When you hear thunder, it makes you feel...?
Humble
When you hear the wind howling, it makes you feel...?
It depends if I’m on land or at sea! I prefer not to hear that when I’m at sea.
Are you an Ocean, Mountain, Forest, or Desert person?
All of them, even though my work has been mostly on oceans
On a scale of 1 to 10, how important is Nature to your well-being?
10
Share with us a childhood nature memory?
First time I saw a starfish in the Mediterranean of my childhood while I was doing my first attempts at snorkeling. It was the most beautiful thing I saw, and memory that still lives with me.
Miki Agrawal
Miki Agrawal was named 2018 Fast Company’s “Most Creative People”, 2017 “Young Global Leader” by World Economic Forum, “Social Entrepreneur of the Year” by the World Technology Summit, “Top 20 millennials on a mission” by Forbes, and was one of INC Magazine’s “Most Impressive Women Entrepreneurs of 2016.” That year, she made the cover of both Entrepreneur Magazine and Crain’s Magazine. She is the recipient of the Tribeca Innovation Award and was named one of the 100 Most Influential People in Brooklyn Culture in 2017 by the Brooklyn Magazine.
She co-founded THINX, a high-tech, period-proof underwear brand and led the company as CEO to a valuation of over $150 Million and to Fast Company’s Most Innovative Companies of 2017, all while helping tens of millions of women period better.
She also founded TUSHY, a company that is revolutionizing the American toilet category with a modern, affordable, designer bidet attachment that both upgrades human health & hygiene as well as the environment from wasteful toilet paper consumption. She and her team are also helping fight the global sanitation crisis by bringing clean latrines to underserved communities in India through their partnership with Samagra. SNL covered TUSHY after its subway campaign was banned. Watch the clip here.
She is the founder of the acclaimed farm-to-table, alternative pizza concept called WILD with 3 locations in New York City, one in Guatemala and more on the way.
Additionally, Harper Collins published her first book entitled "DO COOL SH*T" on entrepreneurship and lifestyle design. Hay House published her second book “Disrupt-Her”.
3 words to describe Nature?
Alive. Present. Symbiotic
3 things Nature taught you?
That we are tiny specs of dust that are here for a short amount of time, so we must add more to nature than take away from it.
3 most treasured Nature spots?
The Catskills
My backyard garden
Redwood forest in California
When you look at the ocean, it makes you feel…?
Ever-present
When you see a forest, it makes you feel…?
Meditative
When you see a volcano, it makes you feel…?
Powerful
When you see a sunrise or sunset, it makes you feel…?
Rejuvenated
When you hear thunder, it makes you feel…?
Energetic
When you hear the wind howling, it makes you feel…?
Alive
Are you an Ocean, Mountain, Forest, or Desert person?
Forest
On a scale of 1 to 10, how important is Nature to your well-being?
10
Share with us a childhood nature memory?
Going camping in Stowe with my family and climbing Mt Orford at 3 years old and feeling very accomplished :-)
John Wood
JOHN WOOD is the founder of Room to Read, an organization that believes World Change Starts with Educated Children. Room to Read envisions a world in which all children can pursue a quality education that enables them to reach their full potential and contribute to their communities and the world.
At age 35, John left his position as Director of Business Development for Microsoft’s Greater China region to found Room to Read.
John’s award-winning memoir, Leaving Microsoft to Change the World: An Entrepreneur’s Odyssey to Educate the World’s Children tells how he raised millions from a “standing start” to develop one of the fastest-growing nonprofits in history. The book was described by Publishers’ Weekly in a starred review as “an infectiously inspiring read.” Translated into 20 languages, it is popular with entrepreneurs, philanthropists, and educators alike, and was selected by Amazon.com as one of the Top Ten Business Narratives of 2006 and voted a Top Ten Nonfiction title of 2006 by Hudson Booksellers. The book was also featured during John’s appearance on The Oprah Winfrey Show and the resulting “Oprah’s Book Drive” with Room to Read raised over $3 million from viewers.
John’s follow up book, Creating Room to Read: A Story of Hope in the Battle for Global Literacy, tells the story of how the organization successfully tackled the next steps of scaling beyond his wildest dreams while maintaining integrity and raising money in a collapsing economy.
John has been named by Goldman Sachs as one of the world’s 100 Most Intriguing Entrepreneurs, has been a three-time speaker at the Clinton Global Initiative and is a five-time winner of Fast Company Magazine’s Social Capitalist Award. He has been honored by Time Magazine’s “Asian Heroes” Award, selected as a “Young Global Leader” by the World Economic Forum, is a Lifetime Achievement Honoree of the Tribeca Film Festival’s Disruptive Innovation Awards, and is a Henry Crown Fellow at the Aspen Institute. He was selected by Barron’s as one of the “25 Best Givers” in 2009 and 2010, ranking 11th and 9th on the list, respectively. In 2014, John won the World’s Children’s Honorary Award Laureate through the World’s Children’s Prize, the annual educational program for the rights of the child and democracy—often called the Children’s Nobel Prize. In recognition of his passion to open libraries for the most under-served populations, he was described by the San Francisco Chronicle as “the Andrew Carnegie of the developing world.”
John also serves on the advisory board of the Clinton Global Initiative and New Story.
Since 2000, Room to Read has impacted the lives of ten million children across Asia and Africa through its programs in Literacy and Girls’ Education. It aims to reach 15 million children by 2020.
3 words to describe Nature?
Best. Thing. Ever.
3 things Nature taught you?
Take time from work to enjoy it.
Breathe deep
Stay in shape, stay young.
3 most treasured Nature spots?
Annapurna Circuit of Nepal, because a hike there inspired the formation of Room to Read
Any hiking trail in my adopted home city of Hong Kong
When you look at the ocean, it makes you feel...?
Grateful to live near it.
When you see a forest, it makes you feel...?
Like I need to put on my hiking or running shoes, grab my wife Amy, and get out there!
When you see a volcano, it makes you feel...?
Assuming it’s dormant, like climbing to the top. If active, then reminds me that I need to update my will ☺
When you see a sunrise or sunset, it makes you feel...?
I’m hugely nocturnal, so sunrises not happening for me. Sunset makes me do a reality check on whether I’ve accomplished all the work goals I’ve had that day, and if not, to get on it.
When you hear thunder, it makes you feel...?
Like I need to grab a good book, lie on the sofa, and enjoy the warmth and security
When you hear the wind howling, it makes you feel...?
Like I should be out hiking
Are you an Ocean, Mountain, Forest, or Desert person?
The latter 3, impossible to decide
On a scale of 1 to 10, how important is Nature to your well-being?
10. I globe-trot constantly for Room to Read, and in every city I always try to find Nature, and of course build my holidays in places like the Dolomites and Namibia and Nepal so that I can over-dose on it.
Share with us a childhood nature memory?
The first time I skied in Colorado I knew that I needed to abandon dreams of university on the east coast, and so I ended up having four very happy years at the University of Colorado in Boulder.
Eric Termuende
ERIC TERMUENDE is on a mission to change the way we talk about work. A bestselling author, speaker, and entrepreneur, Eric is co-founder of NoW Innovations and has been featured in Forbes, Inc., Thrive Global, the Huffington Post and many others. In 2015, Eric was recognized as a Top 100 Emerging Innovators under 35 globally by American Express. Eric sat as Community Integration Chair for Global Shapers Calgary, a community that functions under the World Economic Forum. He is a former Canadian G20 YEA Delegate, representing Canada in Sydney in 2014. Eric is currently signed by the National Speakers Bureau and travels the world talking about the future of work and multiple generations in the workplace. In 2016, Eric spoke at TEDxBCIT in Vancouver giving his presentation entitled ‘Bigger than Work’. Eric has worked and spoken with clients across the world. His new bestselling book, Rethink Work is now available on Amazon and in bookstores across Canada.
3 words to describe Nature?
Peaceful. Untouched. Alive
3 things Nature taught you?
Patience
Appreciation
Calmness
3 most treasured Nature spots?
Mackenzie Mountains,
Kootenay Lake
Deep Cove
When you look at the ocean, it makes you feel...?
Small
When you see a forest, it makes you feel...?
Refreshed
When you see a volcano, it makes you feel...?
Insignificant
When you see a sunrise or sunset, it makes you feel...?
Relaxed
When you hear thunder, it makes you feel...?
Exhilarated
When you hear the wind howling, it makes you feel...?
Energized
Are you an Ocean, Mountain, Forest, or Desert person?
Mountain
On a scale of 1 to 10, how important is Nature to your well-being?
10
Share with us a childhood nature memory?
This is a photo I took in the Mackenzie Mountains, Northwest Territories. This is a perfect example of how small I felt in a part of the world that had never been seen or touched by humans. Ever.