Futuremaker in Focus: Paqui Lizana on Designing Brave, Human Futures
The Thread That Keeps Pulling: A Conversation with Paqui Lizana
Paqui Lizana, Global Head of Tech Strategy at IKEA and Co-Founder of Brilliant Failures, compares her first Singularity experience to "an explosion, like a cocktail coming together." The aerospace engineer turned innovation catalyst arrived at our Executive Program in October 2023, in what she describes as an "ice stage," mentally primed for disruption.
After that initial immersion, she returned as an Abundance 360 member. More recently, she joined our Future of Biotech program virtually from her home office. That experience sparked an unexpected epiphany about how transformation truly happens.
That moment unearthed something deeper: the tension between presence and possibility that defines how many of our alumni stay connected long after the Executive Program ends.
Paqui says that the Executive Program does something profound—it injects a spirit and willingness to do something brave and good for the world. Paqui maintains close connections with different alumni, always dreaming of returning to collaborate on something meaningful. "It's really a loss if we don't dare to actually do something," she reflects. Driven to action, she moves fast to connect and execute, powered by imagination. Yet she's also learned the importance of breathing, giving space, cultivating meaning, and enjoying the process itself.
Take her connection with Christian von Reventlow, for instance. She first met him during the program—a Singularity expert with a rare mix of technical depth and disarming humor who lingered in her thoughts. "I kept thinking: I need to talk to him again." When they crossed paths months later at the Dubai Future Forum, what began as a warm reunion sparked into something more. Their conversations deepened around a shared curiosity, and an epigenetics moonshot started to take form. There was no formal plan, just a spark and the feeling that something important might grow from it.
What makes this particularly remarkable is that someone without a biotech background can now meaningfully contribute to biotechnology innovation. "The future of manufacturing isn't robotics," Paqui observes, "it's biotech." This intersection of disciplines, this cross-pollination of expertise, exemplifies how different possibilities emerge when diverse minds connect.
"Having the connections and impulse that these brave people have is just a forever gift," Paqui reflects.
As Aaron Frank had predicted, the breakthroughs and mind-shaping revelations came in waves over the following weeks and months. But when Paqui returned from Silicon Valley, everything shifted. "I remember entering my office and throwing away all the notes on my desk—the development papers, everything. None of it was valid anymore," she recalls, the memory still visceral.
Finding Ways Forward
By the time our biotech program launched, that early connection had crystallized into a quiet collaboration, still in motion, but fueled by shared momentum. Paqui joined the program virtually, seeking insights to take their vision further.
"Everything suddenly made sense," she said. "The program connected dots I didn't even know existed. It validated why we're building this."
What Paqui articulates isn't resignation about virtual limitations; it's determination to stay engaged despite them. Yes, information is everywhere. Yes, in-person creates a different kind of magic. But the thread connecting her to Singularity, and her friends, she said, the ones she shared highs and lows about life around a fire in Mountain View—to new ideas, to possibility, keeps pulling her forward.
"It's about the sense-making we do together," she reflects. "These days human connection, intention, and presence is the most incredible thing we can do." Whether in the same room or across continents, what matters is maintaining those connections, finding ways to learn and build together.
Experiments in Progress
"I'm composting," Paqui explains when asked about her post-Singularity approach. While Silicon Valley obsesses over immediate returns and rapid scaling, she's now thinking more and more how to bring resilience and fast pace together, deliberately letting ideas develop at their own pace. She is applying venture capitalism to personal potential: launching multiple experiments to map expanding capabilities.
In a world racing toward the next breakthrough, Paqui suggests that the real disruption might be in slowing down again. Very difficult to say for her.
This philosophy birthed Brilliant Failures Studio.
"I believe we need to be more daring to fail. Daring to explore, and brave to make something brilliant out of it. In a world where machines deliver perfect answers and polished images, the failures, the glitches of the system are defining human moments."
She has developed a framework to design AI systems based on connection, a working mothers AI cohort, future of innovation framework featured at MIT and Forbes last year, and now she is working on a practical framework for building better futures—a space where we can put all our three intelligences to work together: AI, Nature, People. Rather than replacing human capacity, the studio explores where technology amplifies what we already possess.
The inspiration source surprises everyone. Despite encountering Silicon Valley's exponential evangelists and tech prophets, Paqui's primary influence remains her grandmother, Pepa. "She's still the one who inspires most of what I'm doing."
"Our grandparents are the biggest lived databases we have on earth," Paqui reflects. "Purpose doesn't come with a download—it comes from the beautiful imperfection of lived experience."
This juxtaposition, ancestral wisdom guiding cutting-edge technology, uncovers something essential about transformation: sometimes the oldest truths are the most radical innovations.
"We have inherited impossible creativity from our families," Paqui says. "We have all this amazing tech around us, evolving at a pace we can no longer digest. Unless we also start to collaborate exponentially." Her dream is focused yet expansive: "I want to work on this, to have just a little piece in advancing human potential, unveiling things we can't do today. Let's become radical innovators again."
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