Meet our Leadership Team
Matt Paese, Ph.D. is the Senior Vice President of Leadership Insights for DDI. Matt is a globally recognized leadership coach, consultant, author, keynote speaker, and pioneer of top approaches for helping leaders succeed. He is the lead author of Leaders Ready Now: Accelerating Growth in a Faster World (2016) and co-author of its award-winning predecessor, Grow Your Own Leaders (2002), which have shaped over two decades of impact in growing leaders into skilled, self-aware, compassionate enterprise executives.
Matt has advised thousands of CEOs, senior teams, and executives in more than 20 countries. As a researcher, product designer, and practitioner, he brings practical clarity to the science of leadership effectiveness. He is sought-after for his expertise in leadership development, senior team effectiveness, and executive and leadership succession and onboarding. He regularly authors articles and white papers on these topics, and has been featured in The Wall Street Journal, New York Times, Forbes, Fortune, Chief Executive, Board Leadership Journal, The Conference Board, and Human Resources Executive.
As an entrepreneur, Matt was one of several originators who launched DDI’s Executive Services business in 1995. DDI has since provided coaching, development, and consulting to hundreds of thousands of executives in more than 3,000 organizations worldwide. He led the development and implementation of industry-leading solutions in executive succession and assessment, coaching, C-suite team effectiveness, and board leadership. Matt was the principal architect of many DDI proprietary services, including Business Driver Analysis, Executive Focus Coaching, and Pressure Point Development, which is rapidly altering the global landscape of high-speed, just-in-time development for executives.
Matt holds a Ph.D. in Industrial/Organizational Psychology from the University of Missouri-St. Louis, and a B.A. in Psychology from St. Norbert College in De Pere, Wisconsin. He is a member of the American Psychological Association (APA) and an active contributor to the Society for Industrial/Organizational Psychology (SIOP).
Before joining DDI in 1994, Matt was with Anheuser-Busch for four years, where he managed executive assessment and development programs throughout the corporation.
An avid fly fisherman, cyclist, barista, volunteer coach, and closet musician, Matt and his wife, Ellen, divide their time between St. Louis and New York.