Our TEAM
Rita J. King
Leadership Advisor, Ethnographer, Futurist
Rita J. King specializes in the evolution of culture during periods of tumultuous transformation. By studying the relationship between humans and our evolving tools, she helps C-suite executives and organizations of kinds navigate complex systems to create new ways of working.
Rita’s career is defined by applying the scientific method to interpersonal dynamics. She has advised numerous Fortune 50 and Fortune 100 clients on aligning their workforce with business goals. As a Futurist at The National Institute of Aerospace (NASA Langley’s think tank), she reimagined the future of work and collaborative environments for scientists, entrepreneurs and engineers. As IBM Innovator-in-Residence, she developed new approaches to culture and remote collaboration for high stakes global teams. She is the founder of Power Pairs, which brings Color Mindset to life for individuals and organizations of any size.
Rita works at the highest levels of policy and ethics, studying how digital culture and the emergence of new tools transforms the real world. She has served as a Senior Fellow at Salzburg Global Forum and the Carnegie Council for Ethics in International Affairs, where she co-led a 25-country study on the real world impact of digital culture. At The Aspen Institute, she served as a Security Futurist and Culture & Security Fellow.
Her work has been featured in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Fast Company, Forbes, CNN, MSNBC, and many more, and in best-selling books including The Art of Noticing, Bored and Brilliant and The Happiness of Pursuit. Rita was awarded an Honorary Doctorate in Applied Imagination from Centenary University in 2017. Rita believes we are better served thinking of AI as Applied Imagination rather than artificial intelligence.
Dr. Deirdre Kelly
Cognitive Scientist, UX Research Leader,
Designer of Quality Systems
Dr. Deirdre Kelly is a Cognitive Science and UX Research Leader focused on designing quality systems that strengthen human decision-making, learning, and performance in complex, high-reliability environments. Her work integrates cognitive science, UX research, service design, and human–system integration to help organizations move beyond compliance toward adaptive, human-centered performance.
She is launching The Color Mindset platform with her research collaborator Rita J. King. Color Mindset is a research-informed approach that expands organizational thinking beyond black-and-white rules and grey compromise toward richer, more nuanced sense-making across companies, teams, and individuals.
A sought-after speaker and writer, Deirdre brings research to life, translating cognitive and behavioural science into practical insight that helps leaders and organizations think, decide, and perform differently.
Dr. Simon Sagmeister
Business Culture Design, Entrepreneur, Advisor
Dr. Simon Sagmeister is the author of Business Culture Design and the creator of the Culture Map approach. He is the founder and CEO of The Culture Institute in St. Gallen.
Simon combines academic knowledge with practical leadership expertise and intercultural experience. His focus on corporate culture has accompanied him throughout his entire professional and academic career. He has worked in organizational development at Julius Blum GmbH and as a management consultant for Oliver Wyman and the Malik Management Center St. Gallen.
Simon Sagmeister earned his PhD at the University of Innsbruck with a dissertation on “Developing Cultural Competence” (summa cum laude). His academic career also took him to the European Business School in London, the University of Sydney, ESADE Barcelona, Copenhagen Business School, and Columbia University in New York.
He has collaborated with Power Pairs founder Rita J. King, a Culture Map practitioner for over a decade through partnership with Science House in NYC.
Dr. Gabriel A. Silva
Scientific Advisor & Neuroscientist
Reverse-engineering the algorithms of the human mind.
Dr. Gabriel A. Silva is a Professor of Bioengineering and Neuroscience at the University of California, San Diego (UCSD), holding the J. Robert Beyster Endowed Chair in Engineering. He stands at the forefront of a new frontier: decoding the biological physics of how we think. He is also the Founding Director of the Center for Engineered Natural Intelligence and the Associate Director of the Kavli Institute for Brain and Mind.
As the Founding Director of the Center for Engineered Natural Intelligence (CENI), Silva studies brain anatomy and maps the mathematics of "intrinsic intelligence."
His work contributes to the rigorous scientific bedrock for Color Mindset and Power Pairs, the tool that brings Color Mindset to life. By bridging the gap between biology and engineering, he helps ensure that Color Mindset is not just a philosophy, but a methodology grounded in the reality of how the human brain functions.
