Tamsen Webster
About
About Tamsen Webster - Selected for 2022 Thinkers50 Radar, Best-selling Author, Keynote Speaker on Communication:
Part message designer, part English-to-English translator, and now part doctoral student, Tamsen Webster helps leaders craft their case for large-scale change. A sought-after speaker and consultant, she’s spent more than 25 years developing the field and practice of persuasive message design, with a particular focus on the principles and processes that build buy-in that lasts.
In addition to her work in and for major organizations such as Harvard Medical School, Fidelity Investments, and Databox, she built and delivers the message design curriculum for Elemental Impact, a leading investor in impact startups. She’s a judge and mentor for the Harvard Innovation Labs and a professional advisor at the Martin Trust Center for MIT Entrepreneurship. She’s also spent over 10 years as the Idea Strategist for one of only nine legacy-level TEDx events and was named to the Thinkers50 Radar in 2022. She's the author of two best-selling books, Find Your Red Thread: Make Your Big Ideas Irresistible, and Say What They Can't Unhear: The 9 Principles of Lasting Change which was named one of the top 10 management books of the year by Canada's Globe and Mail newspaper and one of 6 Books to Transform How You Lead and Communicate by Forbes.
Tamsen was a reluctant marathoner… twice; is a champion ballroom dancer (in her mind); and learned everything she knows about messages, people, and change as a Weight Watchers leader. True story.
She lives in Boston with her husband, two sons, and her two brindle Greyhounds, Hazel and Walnut.
Topics and Audience Takeaways
What Tamsen Webster Talks About:
Say What They Can’t Unhear: How To Inspire Change That Lasts
In a world of constant change, how can leaders inspire transformations that truly endure? Tamsen Webster, acclaimed speaker and author of “Say What They Can’t Unhear: The 9 Principles of Lasting Change,” presents a groundbreaking approach to creating lasting shifts in organizations, markets, and individual lives.Drawing from over 30 years of experience in message design and change communications, Webster challenges conventional wisdom about change management. She reveals why traditional methods often fall short and introduces a powerful new framework for inspiring change that stands the test of time.Whether you’re navigating a corporate pivot, launching a disruptive product, or seeking personal growth, this keynote will equip you with the tools to not just initiate change, but to make it last. Learn how to turn a momentary “yes” into an enduring commitment with ideas that resonate so strongly, they become impossible to “unhear.”Key Takeaways:
- Understand why change is a reaction, not just an action, and how to align your approach accordingly
- Learn to craft a case for change that resonates with your audience’s existing beliefs and identity
- Discover strategies to overcome resistance without relying on pain or pressure
- Master the art of turning short-term agreement into long-term commitment
Built for Buy-In: The Fundamentals of Message Design
Getting your ideal audience to see your message as right for them—quickly—is critical, especially when there’s so much competition for time, attention, and resources. But what do you do when all the reasons your message is “right” aren’t right for those you’re talking to? In this practical and energizing presentation, 25-year message strategist and speaker Tamsen Webster will show you how to get people invested (literally and figuratively!) in all you have to offer, starting with the easiest storytelling elements for your audience to identify with: the principles that provide common ground for even the most uncommon messages.
After this presentation, you’ll be able to:
- Understand why challenging people’s beliefs is the enemy of action, and what to do instead
- Clearly and quickly identify who is, and isn’t, an ideal fit for your message—and why—so you can focus your efforts where they’ll have the greatest effect
- Follow a framework for simplifying them to their most important, and irresistible, elements and building in buy-in from the beginning
The Logic of Belief: How to Make Inaction Impossible
Every decision ends in an argument. Not the loud kind. The quiet, internal one people have with themselves before they say yes, no, or nothing at all. If you want someone to act, you need to shape that argument so it makes sense to them.This keynote unpacks the Logic of Belief: a way to map out the reasoning behind your idea so clearly that it becomes obvious—and hard to unhear. Through Tamsen Webster’s Core Case method and her updated If–Then–Because–And (ITBA) model, you’ll learn how to surface the rationale that makes change feel not only possible, but inevitable. You’ll see why “problem/solution” messaging so often falls flat, and how to replace it with belief-based reasoning that builds agreement first, then understanding, then action.You’ll leave with a practical framework to turn your own internal logic into a structured, communicable case for your idea—one your audience will believe in enough to act on.
Recent Publications
Tamsen's work gave me a framework for what I had felt and thought before but wasn't able to always replicate
AVP, Atrium Health
