Light Actions

Heavy expectations
get lighter when
you start moving.

The more seasoned you are as a leader, the less uncertainty surprises you. Curveballs, competitive shifts, chaos — you've seen it before.

But unsurprised doesn't mean unburdened. Figuring it out still feels heavy. Anyone carrying the weight of becoming an "AI-forward organization" feels this acutely.

Light Actions are
the antidote.

Small, safe steps that help you learn. They don't come after clarity — they create it.

Amy Bonsall Hi, I'm Amy Bonsall.

I spent a decade at IDEO helping leaders move on things that felt too big to start. New products, new capabilities, new markets. Now I help you use AI to answer the question: what can we do today we couldn't a year ago? From processes reimagined to offers you couldn't have imagined before.

Start moving today.

AI in Action

Hands-on work for senior leaders ready to move from "AI is interesting" to "AI is changing what's possible in my business."

Leadership programs

Facilitated programs and offsites that build a culture of experimentation and confident action.

Keynotes

Talks on uncertainty, AI adoption, and momentum.

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Ready to find your light action?

Get in touch
Amy Bonsall speaking at Tugboat Institute
Speaking & Writing

Ideas that move
leaders forward.

Amy speaks on leading through uncertainty, building cultures of experimentation, and AI adoption for senior leaders. Her talks leave audiences with concrete moves — not just new perspectives.

Reach out to inquire

Keynotes & talks

Uncertainty: friend or foe

The leaders who move fastest in uncertainty aren't the ones who eliminate it — they're the ones who've learned to work with it.

Audiences leave with a concrete framework for acting before clarity arrives — and a different relationship with ambiguity.

Tugboat Institute Gathering of Teams · Nashville · ~500 executives

Heavy expectations → light actions

This talk introduces the Light Actions framework — small, safe experiments that create real momentum without requiring perfect conditions.

Audiences leave with a move they can make before the week is out.

AI is not the disruption. Our response to it is.

For executive audiences navigating AI adoption: what it takes to move from "AI is interesting" to "AI is changing what's possible in my organization."

Audiences leave with a shared language for AI adoption and a first step that isn't a task force.

Writing & podcasts

Articles
Use design thinking to navigate ambiguity (HBR)
How part-time senior leaders can help your business (HBR)
3 types of meetings and how to do each one well (HBR)
Stressed by ambiguity? How to turn problems into opportunities (I by IMD)
Gripped by uncertainty? How to unfreeze through experimentation (I by IMD)
Where you look is where you go (I by IMD)
Podcasts
How to make fractional leadership work (HBR IdeaCast)

Interested in having Amy speak?

Reach out to start the conversation about availability, topics, and fit.

Get in touch
AI in Action

AI is easier if you
just start building.

You're using AI. Just not yet in the ways that change what's possible. The first step is missing. And you don't have time to figure it out alone.

Get in touch How it works
What we do

Build together.

i. Find what's heavy

Locate the starting point

We find what's making the next step in AI too big or too hard to start.

ii. Make it light

Build something real

We build something right away that changes what's possible.

iii. Build from there

Let momentum compound

Each light action shows the next one. Before long, the bigger moves come into view.

What fluency opens up

Capability compounds.

  • A team that sees you building with AI — and gives itself permission to do the same
  • Processes reimagined. Tools you didn't know to ask for.
  • Offers and capabilities you couldn't have imagined before you started
About

Twenty years of building alongside leaders.

I spent a decade at IDEO helping leaders move on things that felt too big to start — new markets, new capabilities, new ways of leading through uncertainty. AI is that problem right now.

I build in AI every day, and I know where the doors are. I help leaders walk through them.

Get in touch About Amy
IDEO — Founded and led Venture Design practice
Old Navy — VP New Ventures
HBR — Contributing author
Speaker: SXSW · Tugboat Institute

Ready to build?

Tell me what's feeling heavy. We'll find the light action.

Get in touch
About

I'm Amy Bonsall, and my superpower is helping people make heavy things light and fuzzy things clear.

We do this by building together.

After living in Budapest, Lausanne, London, Melbourne, Singapore, and San Francisco, I landed in St. Petersburg, Florida — where the obvious next step was to become obsessed with pickleball. I love learning about other cultures, speak French and Italian pretty well and a few other languages pretty badly, and think a lot about what it means to lead well when the map hasn't been drawn yet.

I founded Light Actions on one conviction: the leaders who move best through uncertainty aren't the ones who wait for clarity — they're the ones who've learned to act without it.

I spent nearly a decade at IDEO leading their Venture Design practice, working alongside executives at Google, Adobe, John Deere, and Barclays to build new capabilities and move on things that felt too big to start. Before that, I was VP of New Ventures at Old Navy, where I co-led the overhaul of a major part of the business.

What I kept seeing, across industries: leaders with real ambition, stalled by the weight of it. Light Actions is the antidote I created.

Get in touch LinkedIn Instagram
Amy Bonsall
IDEO — Founded and led Venture Design practice
Old Navy — VP New Ventures
HBR — Contributing author
IMD — MBA · I by IMD author
Carnegie Mellon — MS Engineering
Speaker: SXSW · Tugboat Institute
Mindfulness Meditation Teacher
The Light Actions Brief

Small moves.
Real momentum.

Ideas, experiments, and light actions for leading through ambiguity — delivered every other Friday.

Get in touch

What are you
working on?

Whether you're thinking about a keynote, a leadership program, or building with AI — reach out and we'll find the right starting point.

Thanks — I'll be in touch soon.

Amy Bonsall

Founder, Light Actions

LinkedIn Instagram

The gap between where you are and where you want to be narrows with one light action.