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David Lim    

Mountaineer; Motivational Speaker; Leader of the First Singapore Everest Expedition

David Lim, CSP, is best known for leading the landmark 1st Singapore Everest Expedition in 1998 (as well as the second in 2001). Partially disabled from a devastating rare nerve disorder since 1998, his comeback story of overcoming the odds made the cover of the Readers Digest magazine in 2001, and has since been translated into eight languages and reached over 35 million readers. He worked in media for nearly a decade until 1999.

Since 1999, Lim has been a sought-after leadership expert, with expertise in motivational and negotiation skills and building high performing teams. These add value to any client event or sustainable change initiatives. Lim’s presentation style is breezy with lots of humor, audience-interactive and backed not only by decades of leadership achievement, but also with an understanding of how adults learn best. This makes his solutions in a presentation or event program more valuable than just hiring an ‘achiever’ type of speaker who may lack a people-development background.

Lim has a B.A. in Law from Cambridge University, and is also a workshop leader, large-group facilitator and teambuilder with a decade of experience across 71 cities, and 30 countries (and still counting!). His leadership expertise has been widely profiled in The Wall Street Journal and Singapore’s The Straits Times newspaper. The Sunday Times described him as “unstoppable” after he summitted his 7th virgin peak in 2012.

A past President of the Asia Professional Speakers ( 2007-8), his work included being an adjunct lecturer for INSEAD Business School (since 2000). Lim hasn’t given up climbing, and is a veteran of over 70 alpine and expedition ascents around the world. Achievements in recent years have included scaling 6000-metre virgin peak in Qinghai and making the first single-day, mobility-impaired ascent of the 4092m Mt Kinabalu in Borneo in 2013.

Lim is a CSP(Certified Speaking Professional), the first and only Singaporean to be conferred the highest designation for professionalism and consistent quality by the National Speakers Association and the Global Speakers Federation (GSF). The CSP is an independent audit of five years information on the firm’s quality, processes and maturity. He joins a group of fewer than 12% of 6000 professional members of the GSF who have this accreditation.

Lim also received in the new CSPGlobal designation in Dec 2013 - The credential is conferred on those who have proven mastery of the core global speaking competencies. Fewer than 30 professionals worldwide have attained this credential.

Speech Topics


Lessons from Everest

In this presentation, David Lim shares not only a story of overcoming the odds, but also how anyone can apply practical steps to seize and stretch goals and bounce back from any setback. In this presentation, audiences learn how to:

  • Set goals, stretch goals, and achieve those goals

  • Improve your belief system to get results

  • Lead, not be led by change

  • Use the 1% rule

  • Take massive action for success

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