Brian Driscoll
Former FBI Senior Executive, Hostage Rescue Team Leader, and High-Performance Teams Expert
- Led the FBI’s elite Hostage Rescue Team and later oversaw the Bureau’s national tactical and crisis response capabilities
- Reveals the leadership principles behind high-performing teams operating in the world’s most demanding environments
- Brings firsthand experience coordinating military, intelligence, law enforcement, and international partners during complex national security missions
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About Brian Driscoll
Download ProfileBrian J. Driscoll, Jr. has spent his career leading elite teams through some of the nation’s most complex crisis response and national security missions. Throughout nearly two decades in federal law enforcement, he led specialized operations spanning counterterrorism, hostage rescue, and tactical command, rising to senior leadership positions within the FBI.
Exclusively represented by Leading Authorities speakers bureau, Driscoll brings audiences inside the leadership lessons behind a career spent guiding organizations through high-stakes moments. Reflecting on his experience building multi-agency teams and partnerships across intelligence, military, and international organizations, he explores what it takes to earn trust and create a culture of shared accountability.
Before joining the FBI, Driscoll served as a Special Agent with the Naval Criminal Investigative Service, working undercover and counter narcotics investigations. As Assistant Director of the FBI’s Critical Incident Response Group, he later oversaw the Bureau’s national tactical and crisis response enterprise. His career also included leadership of the FBI’s elite Hostage Rescue Team, international counterterrorism investigations, and establishing the FBI’s operational response to the evacuation of Afghanistan, where he created systems that continue to support interagency operations. For his actions under fire during tactical operations, he received the FBI Medal of Valor and the FBI Shield of Bravery.
Today, Driscoll is a partner at McChrystal Group, where he advises senior leaders on organizational transformation, strategy execution, and leadership development. He also serves as a Senior Fellow and Lecturer at the Yale Jackson School of Global Affairs, where he continues to engage with the leadership and national security issues shaping organizations and government.
Video Gallery
Brian Driscoll: In Extremis Leadership
Brian Driscoll: In Extremis Leadership
Speech Topics
Download TopicsHow do leaders build teams that respond with confidence under pressure? Brian Driscoll, Jr. takes audiences behind the scenes of hostage rescues, counterterrorism operations, and pivotal moments from his FBI career to illustrate the leadership principles behind high-performing teams. Through candid stories and hard-earned lessons, he reveals why leadership begins by earning the right to lead, how calculated risk shapes extraordinary outcomes, and why leaders who put service before self build the trust that carries teams through crisis.
Brian Driscoll, Jr. takes audiences inside the world of FBI crisis negotiation, where the outcome of a hostage situation or other high-risk encounter often depends less on force than on a negotiator’s ability to build trust. In this keynote, he introduces the proven methods FBI negotiators use to lower emotion and guide people toward resolution.
Centered on the FBI’s Behavioral Change Stairway Model, the keynote reframes conflict as an opportunity to build understanding rather than prove a point. Driscoll demonstrates how the FBI’s approach to crisis negotiation can help leaders lower tension, strengthen relationships, and move difficult conversations toward resolution.
As geopolitical competition intensifies, the distinction between foreign and domestic threats is becoming increasingly blurred. Nation-state adversaries, cyber actors, transnational criminal organizations, and emerging technologies are reshaping the security landscape in ways that demand closer collaboration across government, the private sector, and international partners. With decades of FBI leadership experience, Brian Driscoll helps leaders navigate the security landscape, the intelligence required to stay ahead of evolving threats, and how organizations can build resilience as national security and business risk become more interconnected.
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