George F. Colony

As founder and CEO of Forrester Research, George is one of the most influential thought leaders in the world of business and technology. During his nearly 30-year career, George has become a trusted advisor to CEOs of leading global companies by providing forward-looking and pragmatic analysis on the impact of technology change on business.

Under George's leadership, Forrester operates with the mission to make leaders successful every day and the vision that "technology changes everything" — business, society, government, and consumers. Since Forrester's inception in 1983, its commitment to both the mission and vision has created one of the most successful technology and market research firms worldwide, garnering accolades from Forbes magazine as one of the "200 best small companies in America" in 2008 and from Fortune Small Business as one of the top 100 Fastest-Growing Companies. Forrester also has ranked as the number one analyst firm by The Knowledge Capital Group for three consecutive years and was named one of the 100 Top Places to Work by the Boston Globe.

George's "direct approach and refreshing candor," as noted by BusinessWeek, is one of the key reasons executives seek his guidance on technology and marketing strategies, IT and personal technology trends, and a range of leadership issues. Throughout his career, George has made provocative, tenacious, and groundbreaking technology calls, including the birth of client/server computing, the dot-com implosion, the rise of Social Computing, the transition from IT to BT (business technology), and the burgeoning opportunities enabled by the extended Internet (X Internet), which connects the physical world of things to the digital world of information.

George has participated in the World Economic Forum's annual meeting in Davos, Switzerland, for the past eight years. There, he has spoken on panels covering key business technology issues, such as the demise of the Internet bubble, the future of open source, and the evolution of global Innovation Networks, and most recently, he led a workshop about corporate social networking. He also serves as a member of the Forum’s Tech Pioneers selection committee.

George has also addressed other national and international audiences, including the 2006 Fortune Brainstorm conference in Aspen, Colo.; the Houston CIO Executive Summit; The Commonwealth Club of California; the Fortune Global Forum 2005 in Beijing; the SBS Seoul Digital Forum 2005; the United Nations conference, "The Net World Order: Bridging the Global Digital Divide;" and the ICT World Forum @ CeBIT, the most prestigious IT and communications event in Europe.

George's analysis has been quoted in the Wall Street Journal, the Times (London), the Economist, Wired, BusinessWeek, Forbes, Financial Times, and the New York Times, among numerous other publications and social media, and he has been interviewed on prominent broadcast outlets, such as CNN, CNBC, and National Public Radio. Read George's blog, Counterintuitive, or follow him on Twitter.