Wolfgang Gründinger

Dr. Wolfgang Gründinger is a future lobbyist, author and publicist – and is one of Germany’s most prominent and outspoken thought leaders.

With a clear stance, well-founded analysis and a keen sense of the social issues of the future, he gets to the heart of topics such as intergenerational justice, digitalisation, climate protection and political responsibility.

Wolfgang Gründinger has received numerous awards for his work, including the ‘Das Politische Buch’ prize, the Prize for Political Journalism, the German Environmental Foundation Book Prize and the Intergenerational Justice Prize. Today, he is Chief Evangelist at the Berlin-based solar energy start-up Enpal – the first German company in which Leonardo DiCaprio invested. Previously, he worked at the Bundeswehr’s Cyber Innovation Hub and the German Association for the Digital Economy (BVDW), among others.

Wolfgang Gründinger Lecture topics

• Artificial intelligence (AI), digital ethics, digitalization, digital transformation
• Digitalization and sustainability
• Energy transition, climate crisis, climate change and climate protection
• Intergenerational justice, intergenerational contract, and demographic change
• Future of democracy and sustainability

Furthermore, Wolfgang Gründinger offers lectures, coachings and workshops on the topics:

• Productive Work, Time and Stress Management
• Relationship Building & Professional Networking
• Negotiation

Wolfgang Gründinger’s lectures are deliberately unconstrained, draw the big picture, make abstract and complicated issues understandable, bring concrete examples, are intended to create and sharpen awareness, and motivate to become active. Powerpoint yes – but no bullet-point slides.

Wolfgang Gründinger is an honorary ambassador for the Generational Justice Foundation, a European Digital Leader for the World Economic Forum, a member of Facebook Germany’s “Digitality and Responsibility” discussion group, an associate member of the Club of Rome’s Think Tank 30, a Responsible Leader for the BMW Foundation, a member of the advisory board of Scientists for Future, and a member of GEO magazine’s sustainability advisory board. He is co-founder of Staat-Up, the network for public entrepreneurs.

Capital magazine has twice named Wolfgang Gründinger one of the “Top 40 under 40”. Even before that, Handelsblatt counted him among the “Top 30 under 30.” According to politik&kommunikation, he is one of the “most important players in digitalization in political Berlin”. The magazine t3n included him in its selection of “Digital Pioneers.” Female One Zero counts him among “13 #MaleHeroes who lead by example and work toward equality.”

Wolfgang Gründinger’s doctoral thesis focused on the influence of interest groups in the energy transition. Previously, he studied political and social sciences in Regensburg, Berlin and Santa Cruz (California) and graduated from the Internet Leadership Academy at Oxford University.

He filed an election challenge to the 2013 Bundestag elections before the German Constitutional Court because children and young people were excluded from the right to vote. At the UN World Climate Summit in Cancún in 2010, he was taken away by the police for a protest action. The same thing happened to him once before at the UN World Summit on Sustainable Development in Johannesburg in 2002, where he happened to walk into a protest.

Wolfgang Gründinger is a keynote speaker, lecturer, speaker and moderator on topics such as digital transformation, digital ethics, energy transition, climate crisis, sustainability and futurology. Numerous clients have booked Wolfgang Gründinger as a keynote speaker – including McKinsey, Deloitte, the German Federal Ministry of Labor and Social Affairs, Deutsche Bahn, Google, and many more.

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