ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Annie McKee, PhD, is a bestselling author, respected academic, speaker, and sought-after advisor to global leaders. She is a senior fellow at the University of Pennsylvania Graduate School of Education and has coauthored several groundbreaking books on leadership, including Primal Leadership (with Daniel Goleman and Richard Boyatzis), Resonant Leadership (with Richard Boyatzis), and Becoming a Resonant Leader (with Richard Boyatzis and Frances Johnston), all published by Harvard Business Review Press. These books and her many articles and blogs focus on the power of emotional intelligence to change how we lead and how we engage with our work. Now, in How to Be Happy at Work: The Power of Purpose, Hope, and Friendship, Annie shares wisdom and lessons learned from her decades of experience and research about what enables individuals and their teams to achieve sustainable, meaningful success.

Annie has advised many of the world’s most influential leaders in sectors as varied as energy, media, health care, government, and nonprofits. Whether she is giving talks to business leaders, teaching executive doctoral students, working in provincial government offices in South Africa, or advising teams in the C-suite of Fortune 100 companies, Annie is committed to helping good leaders become great and to creating vibrant workplace cultures.

Annie has taken the road less traveled throughout her life, beginning her career as a community organizer. Then, upon completing her degree, Annie taught at a small college before joining the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School. After a brief stint at a prominent consultancy, she took another risky step—leaving the security of a good job to found a consulting firm focused on developing values-based leadership and resonant organizations.

Today, as a senior fellow at the University of Pennsylvania Graduate School of Education, Annie continues to be guided by her belief that everyone, no matter who they are or what job they have, must be respected, honored, and encouraged to excel. In her work at Penn and beyond, Annie is committed to democracy and to encouraging every human being to seek happiness, health, and well-being. To this end, she supports positive social change in her role as a member of the Homeland Security Science and Technology Advisory Board and as a faculty member of the Police Executive Leadership Institute, a program she codesigned to support police executives in transforming their institutions to meet the needs of our complex cities and changing world.

Annie is married to Eddy Mwelwa, and they have four children and one grandchild: Rebecca, Sean, Sarah, Andrew, and Benji. Annie and Eddy live in Pennsylvania with their three dogs and two cats.