About Robert
Driven by a relentless curiosity, Robert Cooper is an independent scholar and leadership advisor who has devoted three decades to studying how the most exceptional individuals, teams, and organizations achieve what everyone else thinks they can’t. His scientific insights, ultra-practical tools, counterintuitive wisdom, and disciplined metrics have enabled leaders and teams in many industries and fields to produce breakthroughs while everyone else is struggling just to keep from falling behind.
Cooper is chair of Advanced Excellence Systems LLC, a leadership consulting firm, and serves as CEO of Dashboard Metrics LLC. He is a Fellow at the Silicon Valley World Internet Center. For five years he was Chair of the Board for Q-Metrics, a San Francisco-based firm specializing in the metrics of star performance and applied intelligence.
He is the New York Times bestselling author of The Other 90%: How to Unlock Your Vast Untapped Potential for Leadership and Life. His forthcoming leadership book is Get Out of Your Own Way: The 5 Keys to Surpassing Everyone’s Expectations (Crown Business).
Praised as “a national treasure” by Stanford Business School Professor Michael Ray, and called “the ultimate business guru for the new millennium” by USA Today, he has advised executives and rising-star leaders in organizations that include 3M, Barclays Bank, BSB Design, Make-A-Wish Foundation, Navigant Consulting, Northwestern Mutual, and Verizon.
He has lectured at the Stanford Business School, Stanford Executive Program, Management Centre Europe, Ruling Companies Association (Milan Italy), and The Leadership Trust (U.K.). For five years he was the highest-rated faculty member in the Lessons in Leadership Distinguished Speaker Series sponsored by universities and business schools from coast to coast.
In a survey of managers and professionals from more than 90 organizations, his work was compared to twenty widely recognized leadership authorities. He rated highest on every scale, including inherent value, usefulness, applicability, and overall results. In an independent rating by professionals and managers in the Senior Management Interchange, the practical value of his work was rated at 4.9 out of 5.0.
He served in the U.S. Marine Corps during the Vietnam War. An All-American swimmer, he received the University of Michigan’s Honor Trophy Award for “outstanding achievement in scholarship, athletics, and leadership.” He lives in Ann Arbor, Michigan, with his wife and children.