Join the Harvard and Yales clubs and Dr. Branden Thornhill-Miller who will be serving up a tantalizing buffet of projects and research from applied psychology and behavioral economics. Farmed from years of his work teaching, researching, and directing programs at Oxford, the Sorbonne, Harvard, Georgetown, and leadership programs around the world, these “vignettes” will focus on the positive and negative human factors that, interacting with technology, are shaping our work, our lives, and our collective futures. Recently, these interests have led him to establish the “Creative Futures Institute,” a new non-profit think tank.

Here’s what’s on the menu:

• “The ‘4Cs’ shaping the Future of Education & Work in the Era of AI: Creativity, Critical Thinking, Communication & Collaboration”
• “Creativity Profiling: inventing psychometric tools to identify and train creativity in different professions (using the example of law)
• “Virtual Reality, Artificial Intelligence & the Enhancement of Creativity”
• “Understanding Yourself in Order to Lead Others” (project gamifying self-awareness of crucial individual differences)
• “Cognitive Biases and Luxury Consumption East & West”
• “Risk & Value Profiling to Nudge Sustainable Investment” (project for a major bank)

Discussions may also be seasoned with other projects, ranging from the psychology behind monumental art to whether passionate love differs (psychometrically) in France, and how cognitive biases might reshape our understanding of religious beliefs.

Each research vignette will serve as a bite-sized appetizer for questions and further discussion, also continuing over drinks and hors d’oeuvres after the talk.

BIOGRAPHY

Dr. Branden Thornhill-Miller (Thornhill-Miller.com) is a professor, entrepreneur, and consultant in psychology and behavioral economics, holding degrees from Yale (Ethics, Politics & Economics, and Literature), Harvard (World Religions), and Oxford (Experimental Psychology). For 15+ years, he has worked and collaborated at the University of Oxford, as a member of the psychology and philosophy faculties and serving as a lecturer or fellow at two colleges. He has also been a visiting professor at Georgetown, Beijing University, and the Moscow Presidential Academy.

An expert in “individual differences psychology” (e.g., personality, emotional intelligence, creativity, cognitive biases, leadership, and psychometric testing), Branden integrates these with topics like culture, values, gender, world religions, and technology (including VR, AI, and 21st-century skills). During the past decade he has trained leaders from around the world, as VP of Preparing Global Leaders’ schools in five countries, taught and supervised theses at the Sorbonne, and served as Director of the Creativity Profiling Project (CreativityProfiling.org).

He is co-CEO of the International Institute for Competency Development ( IICD.net; co-founded with AFNOR), aiming to innovate the future of education and work. More recently he has established the Creative Futures Institute (CreativeFutures.Institute), a non-profit think tank focused on the interaction of human factors and technology shaping the future.