Dom Mullins

Groundbreaking Adventurer, Part of the First All-Black Expedition to Summit Mount Everest, Sociologist
Dom Mullins Speaker
  • History-making outdoor adventurer who was part of the first all-Black expedition to summit Mount Everest and is inspiring diverse groups to enter into the world of adventuring
  • His action-packed retellings of his expeditions tie in research-driven insights for optimizing mindset and enhancing teamwork in support of fostering high-performance teams
  • Combines lessons learned from his combat career and adventuring pursuits to share proven strategies for thriving in high-risk environments

Play Video View Fees Add to List

Check Fees & Availability

Never one to be bound by the limits society has set for him, Demond “Dom” Mullins is a pioneering adventurer whose remarkable feats of grit and endurance against all odds are inspiring the next generation of diverse adventurers. He is a member of Team Full Circle, which made history by becoming the first all-Black expedition to summit Mount Everest in the spring of 2022. Mullins is among the most influential voices in the outdoor adventure community known for his endeavoring spirit and unyielding tenacity, as well as his ability to impart these traits into his teams on the journey to unlocking peak performance to achieve a shared purpose.

Exclusively represented by Leading Authorities speakers bureau, Mullins weaves his experiences braving the world’s most ambitious mountain expeditions with quantitative and qualitative insights from his sociological research to share fundamental strategies for mastering your mindset in support of individual and collective success. Mullins piques the audience’s interest immediately as he paints a vivid picture of his awe-inspiring expeditions in a way that makes listeners feel as though they’re ascending to the top with him. He outlines the strategies and skills that were crucial to his teams’ success in demanding environments where survival was never guaranteed and provides a gameplan for teams in any field to adapt them to their organizations as they embark on their own adventures toward high performance on the way to the mountaintop.

Mullins is an enthusiastic outdoorsman and a leading sociologist whose research centers on the benefits of outdoor recreation on the human experience, particularly mountaineering. He is a combat veteran who, upon returning home following a tour in Iraq, sought to make sense of his experiences by immersing himself in his studies. This eventually led to his ethnographic study on Veteran Expeditions, during which he became part of a team of veteran adventurers who, in 2015, reached the top of Alaska’s Denali, the highest mountain peak in North America. In addition to the history-making expedition with Team Full Circle, he has summited Mt. Kilimanjaro and Mt. Kenya. Originally a passionate and accomplished dancer, Mullins’ inner adventurer was awakened on a hiking trip in Colorado in 2010. Drawn to the camaraderie and tests of mental fortitude and human endurance, he soon began to seek more challenging pursuits in mountaineering, rock climbing, and ice climbing.

Prior to setting out to achieve his goals in the world of adventuring, Mullins held various roles in academia and as an advocate for our nation’s veterans. He was an instructor, assistant professor, and adjunct professor at high-ranking universities, and a board member for Veterans Green Jobs. Most recently, he held the role of adjunct assistant professor at The Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art. He earned his PhD. in sociology from The City University of New York and continues to open doors for people in underserved and underrepresented groups to lead the reimagining of what an adventurer can look like.

Continue Reading »

Speaker Video

Dom Mullins: The Makings of an Extreme Team

Mountaineer group aims to become first all-Black team to climb Everest

Did You Know Black People Were Banned From National, State Parks?

Mastering Your Mindset to Reach Your Summit. When Dom Mullins returned home from combat in Iraq, he struggled to make sense of his experiences and how he could adequately reacclimate himself to civilian life. He dedicated his research to studying the ways returning veterans reintegrate into society and became a powerful voice advocating on their behalf. But it wasn’t until he went on a hiking excursion that his eyes were opened to the lessons outdoor adventuring teaches on mindset, teamwork, and peak performance and how they can be applied to any undertaking in the workplace and life.

He leads audiences on a breathtaking, edge-of-your-seat expedition as he reflects on his adventure with Team Full Circle to become the first all-Black expedition to summit Mount Everest, as well as his journeys to the tops of Denali, Mt. Kilimanjaro, and Mt. Kenya. Each step of the way, he points audiences toward dynamic tactics applied for success in the far reaches of nature’s most challenging environments and demonstrates how they can be adapted within their own organizations to spark positive mindset shifts from top to bottom, enhance team dynamics, and set strong foundations for achieving superior results in any field.

Mapping Your Climb to Success. Groundbreaking adventurer Dom Mullins is no stranger to overcoming seemingly impossible challenges. A combat veteran, he braved the do-or-die battlefields of Iraq and, upon returning to civilian life, discovered meaning, purpose, and camaraderie in the world of outdoor adventuring. He has taken on some of nature’s most formidable challenges head on, including summiting Denali, Mt. Kilimanjaro, and Mt. Kenya — all of which prepared him for his greatest challenge yet: summiting Mt. Everest as part of Team Full Circle, the first all-Black expedition to complete the climb up the world’s tallest mountain.

In this uplifting talk, Mullins tells the awe-inspiring story of his unconventional path into the world of adventure — beginning with his return home from war and the struggles that followed, all the way to summiting Everest to make history with Team Full Circle. As he takes the audience along for the journey atop the world’s highest peaks, he demonstrates the ways in which they can transform their doubts and fears into unending confidence. He instills the belief that any goal can be achieved with dedication, preparation, perseverance, and commitment, and inspires people to set out to achieve the impossible.

The Nature of High-Performance Teams. Working together is among one of the few true superpowers humans possess. When adventure, combat veteran, and sociologist Dom Mullins summited Mount Everest to reach the pinnacle of mountaineering, he did so alongside his teammates, without whom, the endeavor would have been twice as challenging, if not impossible. As Mullins shares with audiences, the workplace is not unlike an adventure. It has twists, turns, and obstacles, all of which are much easier to navigate working as part of a team united by shared objectives.

From communication and collaboration to transparency and inclusion, Mullins outlines the principles of effective communication that were critical to Team Full Circle making history by becoming the first all-Black expedition to summit Mount Everest and provides straightforward tactics for organizations to implement these principles within their teams to great and tangible effect. Pulling from his own research and experiences, he shares the sociological reasoning behind what makes these principles so impactful for fostering high-performance teams and gives insight into what successful teamwork looks like, and how we as individuals working in groups can maximize our time and potential together.

Continue Reading »