The 2025 Cosmic Conference
The System
is the Strategy
From Agent to Architect
Most leaders are rewarded for solving problems: putting out fires, stepping in to fix what’s broken, jumping into the details. Eventually, they hit a wall. The same issues resurface: teams burn out, silos harden, decisions slow, and growth stalls.
Behind the chaos lies a deeper truth: the system is broken. This is the invisible inflection point, where leadership demands a shift: from heroic problem-solver to systems architect.
What to Expect
Dubai has long been a place where bold ideas are tested, scaled, and shared with the world. From startups to global players, leaders here know what it means to dream big and to design the systems that can sustain growth.
This half-day offsite offers leaders the chance to step back from the pace of business to reflect, learn, and reimagine how systems—at the level of self, team, and organization—shape performance. Surrounded by art and inspiration at the Jameel Arts Centre, this gathering is designed to spark new perspectives and open fresh pathways for leadership.
✨ Reflect on Your Systems
Participate in embodied, facilitated experiences that help you see the patterns you lead every day—and begin to redesign them for greater impact.
🎤 Learn from Scale
Hear from Jad Halaoui, Co-Founder and COO of Washmen, who will share his journey of growing a startup into a standout brand, and the systems he built to sustain scale.
🤝 Build Meaningful Connections
Engage with like-minded leaders, coaches, and experts committed to reimagining how systems—and the people within them—can thrive.
This offsite is designed as a workshop, best experienced in full. We encourage you to join us for the entire session.
💡 One More Reason to Join
Our partners at the Jameel Arts Centre are hosting us in their remarkable space on the Dubai Creek. Surrounded by thought-provoking art installations and serene views, the venue is designed to spark reflection. For those joining us for lunch, the conversation continues at Teible, a Michelin-starred restaurant celebrating creativity and sustainability.
Who this is for
This offsite is for executives, founders, and leaders who want to pause, reflect, and reimagine the systems they are building—within themselves, their teams, and their organizations.
If you’re ready to:
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Step out of the day-to-day,
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Learn from leaders who have scaled with purpose, and
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Explore how to design systems that sustain performance—
then this gathering is for you.
Fee: 500 AED
Friday, October 31
9 AM to 1:30 PM UAE Time
+ Optional Lunch
dubai
Leaders' Offsite
This Year's Stops
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Conference Experiences
Conference Program
Leaders' Circle
A 3-hour peer circle to explore systems thinking for managers and leaders.
Offsite
A half-day of growth and learning featuring keynotes, meaningful conversations, and embodied experiences to drive the shift from heroic leadership to systems design.
MasterClass
An evening Masterclass where experts and leaders come together to share personal stories of how they moved beyond quick fixes to build smarter, more resilient organizations.
Webinars
1-hour online webinars with experts, academics, and leaders from all over the world.
Webinar
Monday, September 15 | 4 PM UAE Time
Conference Opening
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Leaders' Circle
Friday, September 26 | 9 AM UAE Time
From Agent to Architect
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Leaders' Circle
Friday, October 3 | 9 AM UAE Time
From Agent to Architect
(INSEAD NAA Exclusive)
Leaders' Circle
Friday, October 10 | 5 PM UAE Time
From Agent to Architect
Leaders' Circle
Thursday, October 16 | 9 AM Beirut Time
From Agent to Architect
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Masterclass
Tuesday, October 21 | 8 PM KSA Time
Riyadh Masterclass
Offsite
Friday, October 31 | 9 AM UAE Time
Dubai Offsite
Webinar
Tuesday, November 4 | 5 PM UAE Time
Conference closing
Exploring Systems
Thinking at 3 Levels
At the
leader’s level
At the leadership
team level
At the
organizational level
The most powerful systems are the least visible. You carry one within you, formed by years of habits, assumptions, and inherited ways of working. These inner mechanics shape how you show up, what you notice, and how you lead.
This level of the conference invites you to surface those patterns, examine the architecture beneath your instincts, and build the mindset and muscle to design systems, starting with your own.
When your inner system shifts, everything around you follows.
Some leadership teams operate like well-tuned engines; others grind under the weight of bottlenecks, repeated breakdowns, or competing priorities. The difference isn’t talent, it’s the system leaders operate in.
We’ll look to the patterns that shape the team’s effectiveness: how purpose is shared, how trust, psychological safety, and inclusion are built, and how effort, ideas, decisions, and collective performance flow.
When the system is tuned, the team’s collective capacity multiplies, unlocking performance.
As complexity rises, so does the cost of misalignment: strategies lose coherence, decision-making slows, and once-effective operating models struggle under new realities.
This is where leadership shifts from driving performance to designing the system that delivers it. We’ll explore how to shape an organization using our proprietary model, The Omnichannel Organization™ where people, process, structures, tools, and culture work in concert to deliver enduring results.
When the system works as one, the organization moves with clarity, coherence, and unstoppable momentum.
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PREVIOUS EDITIONS
The Cosmic Conference Over the Years
Great leaders are holistic thinkers.
They recognize that managing in a complex world requires them to master their range, developing the ability to embrace seemingly opposing tensions.
The 2024 Edition of the Cosmic Conference brought leaders in Dubai, Riyadh, and online together to learn how to master these dualities alongside other leaders, experts, and coaches.
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You developed a strategy, now what? A strategy, no matter how brilliant it is, remains wishful thinking if not implemented properly. In fact, bringing the strategy to life is the toughest part because it requires alignment, action, and collaboration.
Join us and learn how to lead your organization to execute strategy with unparalleled precision, and turn plans into real-world victories.
Hybrid work comes with a big set of challenges. Organizations cannot risk having less productive workers and employees don’t want to miss out on creating meaningful connections with others.
With that in mind, we invited thought leaders, experts, academics, entrepreneurs and teams to join us for the 3-day virtual event and share their insights and experience.
The global pandemic catalysed a shift in the way individuals and organizations work. The widespread adoption of remote work has changed how we view the 'where' and 'how' of work.
We set out to help attendees navigate the remote work landscape, learn about its impact on organizations in the region, and how teams and leaders can adapt to our ‘new normal'.