About the Coach

headshot of Brenan Sullivan

Brendan Sullivan is a creativity coach. He helps organizational teams, leaders, and individuals to create more innovative solutions, more successful creative ideas, and a healthier, more collaborative work environment where talented people can flourish. Brendan’s programs are informed by his lifetime of practical experience in the corporate world, as well as, applied skills in creativity and innovation. As such, he now creates and leads engaging, entertaining, practical workshops, keynotes, and seminars around collaborative innovation, creativity, as well as team and leadership development.

Brendan is an active member of the Chicago chapter of the Association for Talent Development. He has also presented his programs to his colleagues in the Midwest Facilitators Network and the Association for Experiential Education. Brendan is an approved provider of continuing professional development for the Illinois State Board of Education. He has designed, facilitated, and presented his programs to a wide range of clients. These include large corporations like Kellogg’s, Harley-Davidson, Bristol-Myers Squibb, Sara Lee, Jenny Craig, PepsiCo, Aetna, Marriott Hotels and many others. Also, many smaller companies, nonprofits, schools and government agencies.

Successful improvisation is all about innovating and collaborating in the moment. Brendan has been a professional improvisational performer for over 25 years, a graduate of the world-famous Second City Conservatory. He has also been a director, teacher, and coach of other improvisers. Brendan’s nationally recognized, award-winning improv group “Blue Velveeta” toured the country, creating new theatre in the moment every night, and on cable’s A&E. Brendan still performs improv on stage in Chicago on a weekly basis.

Brendan also was the creative producer, for 10 years, of a top-rated morning radio show in Chicago, the Jonathon Brandmeier Radio Showgram. His job was to provide material for the show with written pieces and humorous character segments. Hence, he developed successful, transferable techniques for generating creative ideas quickly. As an actor and member of the Screen Actors Guild, Brendan has appeared in national television commercials, feature films, television productions, and the theater.

Before all this, Brendan had a "Real Job." He sold advertising for a living, including five years with the New York Times Magazine Group as Midwest Advertising Sales Manager of Family Circle’s special interest magazines. He led a sales team and his clients were national accounts, mainly Fortune 500 consumer products companies. Brendan took a lot of people to lunch and played a lot of golf. His experience provided valuable insights into the corporate world, work teams, leadership, productivity, and management.

Brendan has written for corporate clients and provided scripts that were produced for television and the stage, in addition to feature articles in magazines, and advertising copy for business publications and radio commercials. Brendan is also a co-author of the novel, The Living Wills, published by Eckhartz Press in 2011. He and his wife, Susan, have four children and live in Chicago.