Valerie Won Lee

Valerie Won Lee is an award-winning sustainability keynote speaker, Global Impact Strategist, leadership futurist and creator of the Social-Impact-Global, SIG, Framework. She helps organisations make stronger decisions when sustainability priorities, artificial intelligence, stakeholder expectations and commercial pressures collide. Drawing on more than 25 years of international experience, Valerie supports executives, institutions and leadership teams seeking to create measurable social impact, strengthen organisational resilience and build responsible strategies that work across cultures. Her approach combines human judgement, collective intelligence, systems thinking and AI, enabling leaders to identify blind spots, evaluate trade-offs and move complex sustainability initiatives from ambition into practical action.

Valerie’s career has spanned the corporate, public, humanitarian and nonprofit sectors, giving her a broad understanding of how sustainable transformation must account for people, purpose and performance. One of her most significant former positions was Head of Communications and Stakeholder Engagement for the United Nations Global Platform on Big Data, where she supported international collaboration through the British Civil Service. She has also worked with SAP, Hewlett Packard Enterprise, LVMH, Issey Miyake, Amnesty International, the Pasteur Institute and the Marie Curie Institute. Through these experiences, Valerie developed expertise in cross-cultural strategy, stakeholder negotiation, global communications and responsible technology, all of which shape her work with sustainability, ESG and social-impact leaders.

As the Founder of World Citizen Artists, Valerie created a global platform that united artists, students, businesses and humanitarian organisations around peace, inclusion and human rights. The initiative developed partnerships with organisations including the Bob Marley Foundation, the Gandhi Foundation and Belgravia Gallery, while engaging participants from more than 100 countries. Valerie later distilled her international experience into the SIG Framework, which helps organisations connect social context, measurable impact and global perspective. Her book, ‘Social-Impact-Global: Turning Obstacles Into Bridges’, became an Amazon number one New Release in Nonprofit Marketing & Communications. She is also the author of ‘Decision Shapers’, which explores the seven forces that influence group decisions and provides leaders with practical ways to strengthen collective judgement.

Today, Valerie is a Global Leader for the WomenTech Network across APAC and South Korea, a member of the G100 Global Advisory Council and the recipient of the WomenTech Leader of the Year 2025 Gold Award. She delivers keynotes, executive workshops and AI-Augmented Collective Intelligence Labs for organisations navigating sustainability, responsible AI, stakeholder alignment and systemic change. Valerie has spoken at South Summit Madrid, the QS Higher Education Summit APAC, Johns Hopkins University, Korea University Business School and the University of Bristol. Her presentations show audiences how to address competing priorities, build trust across sectors and make defensible decisions that create lasting value for businesses, communities and the wider world.