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Luis Benitez

Senior Consultant

Between managing expeditions on some of the most remote peaks in the world and his day jobs in the corporate world and academia, Luis ties lessons from the mountains to the everyday challenges of life and business through engaging interactive keynote presentations and seminars.

Throughout his storied career, Luis has summited the top of the famed “Seven Summits” a cumulative 32 times, including being a six-time summiteer of the world’s highest peak, Mt. Everest. Over the course of the past decade, he has quietly emerged among a growing field of inspirational adventurers as one of the more experienced, respected and busiest professional guides and experiential leadership development consultants in the world.

Luis holds a ASEGUIM Guide De Montagne Full Certification Degree from Quito, Ecuador / Chamonix, France. In addition to his leadership development work with the Wharton School of Business, Luis is currently pursuing his Executive MBA at The University of Denver.

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EXPERIENCE

Luis Benitez is a Senior Consultant with FMG Leading, a team of coaches and advisors that help clients achieve breakthrough performance through world-class human capital strategy. Over the course of the past decade, Luis has quietly emerged among a growing field of inspirational adventurers as one of the more experienced, respected and busiest professional guides and experiential leadership development consultants in the world. Throughout his storied career, Luis has summited the top of the famed “Seven Summits” a cumulative 32 times, including being a six-time summiteer of Mt. Everest. Luis also has attempted the famed K2 in 2010.

Luis ties the lessons available from managing mountain expeditions to the everyday challenges of life and business through interactive and engaging keynote presentations and seminars His most recent corporate job was with VF Corporation, where he created and led the global government affairs function and restructured and re-launched The VF Foundation. VF is a Fortune 500 holding company whose portfolio includes some of the most iconic brands in the outdoor industry like The North Face, Supreme, Smartwool, and Timberland to name a few.

Early in his career, Luis was hired by the well-established leadership development school Outward Bound Professional in Colorado, and was responsible for conducting courses in various mountaineering/ climbing/skiing techniques, all with the fundamentals of leadership, communication, and problem solving at the core of the Outward Bound curriculum. Luis has also led expeditions and was Director of Operations USA for Adventure Consultants (AC), a highly respected New Zealand-based expedition firm with a long and storied history of leading trips on Mt. Everest.

ADDITIONAL PRACTICE AREAS

Luis volunteers his time as a guide for the non-profit, Trekking for Kids, which focuses on service based expeditions allowing participants to climb and trek while teaching them about local issues like housing and healthcare for disadvantaged youth around the world. He has championed Talent Management and Leadership Development for Vail Resorts and served as a town Councilman in Eagle, Colorado. Luis previously served as the first State Director for the Office of Outdoor Recreation Industry for the state of Colorado.

TELEVISION AND FILMOGRAPHY

Luis’ first summit of Mt. Everest was a climb with the blind athlete Erik Weihenmayer on his historic 2001 Everest summit, chronicled in the feature film “Farther Than the Eye Can See” and also in Erik’s book “Touch the Top of the World”. He has been featured in films such as “Visions of Everest” (2002) and “Shadow of the Condor” (2002), has reported from Mt. Everest for ABC-TV News, and has filmed segments for an episode of National Geographic’s weekly TV series “Wild Chronicles”.

ACADEMIC AFFILIATIONS AND CERTIFICATIONS

Luis holds a ASEGUIM Guide De Montagne Full Certification Degree from Quito, Ecuador / Chamonix, France. In addition to his leadership development work with the Wharton School of Business, Luis is currently pursuing his Executive MBA at The University of Denver. He has serves as an adjunct professor in Ecuador and Chile for the Wharton School of Business, where he leads an annual critical thinking / leadership development seminar, and at The University of Colorado at Boulder’s Outdoor Recreation Economy masters program.

PERSONAL

Luis lives in Denver, Colorado, with his wife and daughter. When not working, he enjoys mountain biking, fly fishing, skiing, and an active outdoor lifestyle.

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