Everything Mark Pollock does is about inspiring leaders and their teams to build resilience, optimise performance, and collaborate with others so they can achieve more than they thought possible. Unbroken by blindness in 1998, Mark became an adventure athlete, competing in ultra-endurance races across deserts, mountains, and polar ice caps... Read more
Everything Mark Pollock does is about inspiring leaders and their teams to build resilience, optimise performance, and collaborate with others so they can achieve more than they thought possible.
Unbroken by blindness in 1998, Mark became an adventure athlete, competing in ultra-endurance races across deserts, mountains, and polar ice caps — including being the first blind person to race to the South Pole. He also won silver and bronze medals for rowing at the Commonwealth Games and set up an international motivational speaking business.
In 2010, a fall from a second-storey window nearly killed him. Mark broke his back, and the damage to his spinal cord left him paralysed. Now, he is on a new expedition — this time exploring the intersection where humans and technology collide to cure paralysis in our lifetime.
Chairman of Collaborative Cures and founder of the global running series Run in the Dark, Mark has helped catalyse collaborations worth over $100 million in support of his mission to cure paralysis. He was selected by the World Economic Forum as a Young Global Leader and has served on the Global Futures Council on Human Enhancement and the Advisory Board of Cybathlon. In addition, he is a Wings for Life Ambassador (Europe) and served on the Board of the Christopher and Dana Reeve Foundation (USA) for a decade.
Currently, Mark is pursuing a Professional Doctorate in Elite Performance (Sport) at Dublin City University. He is the author of Making It Happen and is the subject of the acclaimed documentaries Blind Man Walking and Unbreakable – The Mark Pollock Story. Mark has been awarded honorary doctorates by the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland and Queen’s University Belfast. Furthermore, he holds a diploma in Global Leadership and Public Policy for the 21st Century from Harvard University, along with degrees from Trinity College Dublin and UCD Smurfit Graduate Business School.
Sometimes we choose our challenges, sometimes our challenges choose us. What we decide to do about them is what counts. Deciding to be a competitor, a realist and a collaborator offers your people a chance of maintaining a resilient mindset under pressure. Mark Pollock’s keynote on adversity and challenges uses...
Uncertainty and change typify a crisis and it’s difficult to lead in such circumstances. By providing your people with insights into the resilience, attitude and decisions of others facing extreme circumstances you will help them to develop the intrinsic motivation to move forward. Mark Pollock’s keynote on leadership and motivation...
It is tough to deliver world class performance. Your people won’t do it by chance. With a high- impact catalyst you can help them act with the courage to make it happen. Mark Pollock’s keynote on mindset and performance is that catalyst – it challenges your people to examine expectations...
Galvanising a disparate group of people around a common goal is not easy. Yet when it happens, when we collaborate, that is when major breakthroughs happen. Mark Pollock’s keynote on collaboration and teamwork provides your people with insight into how high- performance teams get things done when others can’t.
Exploring the intersection where humans and technology collide is essential for businesses to maintain their competitive edge. By raising the consciousness of your people to the human dimension of the 4th industrial revolution, you will empower and encourage innovation at the edge. Mark Pollock’s keynote on human enhancement...