Nataly Kogan

Co-founder & CEO, Happier, Inc.

Boston

Nataly is an entrepreneur, speaker, and author dedicated to helping people transform their lives into meaningful, fulfilling journeys.

Through Happier, a company she founded with the mission to help people live happier lives, Nataly she has inspired hundreds of thousands of people to live with more gratitude and joy. As one of the leading experts on well-being and happiness, Nataly has been featured in hundreds of media outlets, including The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Fortune, New York Magazine, Time, USA Today, The Dr. Oz Show, Bloomberg, and others. She is a sought-out speaker, appearing at TEDxBoston, Fortune's Tech Brainstorm, Blogher, SXSW, The 92nd St. Y, Harvard Women's Leadership Conference and many venues. Her talks are often referred to as "a mix of soulful inspiration, brutal honesty and practical advice," and she has had the honor to reach employees at companies like The Gap and Gillette, college, high school and even middle school students with her powerful message.

Nataly has founded several companies, and spent a decade as a media and technology executive, as well as a venture capital investor. She started her career with McKinsey & Company in New York, and spent five years as an early-stage investor with Hudson Ventures. Nataly launched her own publishing company targeted at college students as well as a leading online community for working mothers. She worked at Microsoft’s state-of-the-art Future of Social Experiences Lab (FUSE), and was the Vice President of Consumer Experience at WHERE (sold to Paypal in 2011).

An immigrant to the US, who escaped the Soviet Union with her parents when she was 13 years old, Nataly has never lost touch with her difficult experience. Her passion for helping people find more genuine joy and meaning in their lives is fueled by the belief she formed while a refugee on the way to the US -- that you can find beauty and kindness and lightness in even the most difficult circumstances.

Her initial failed attempts to find happiness by chasing achievements and success led her to dive into scientific research on happiness, study Buddhism and yoga, and experiment with many different habits to create a simple methodology that leads to happiness that is genuine, lasting, and not dependent on chasing and getting "the next big thing." Inspired by her own transformation, Nataly is on a quest to help people nurture this kind of unconditional joy within themselves, and to stop saying "I’ll be happy when…" and start saying "I’m happier now because..."

Nataly graduated from Wesleyan University with High and University Honors, having majored in the College of Social Studies. She lives in Boston with her husband and daughter but forever remains a New Yorker at heart. Painting, art projects with her daughter, anything with stripes, amazing food, yoga, and the warmth of her family make her happier. She has recently mastered a headstand in yoga, which took five years for her to even attempt.