Ade-Lee Adebiyi
Designer, Speaker and Facilitator
at ParentPay
Creativity Without the Act: How to Stay Real When Everything’s a Performance
Talk Synopsis
We love to talk about creativity, but somewhere along the way, we turned it into performance.
Between brand theatre, design elitism, and performative authenticity, real creativity, the messy, human, unpredictable kind, has been quietly pushed aside.
In this talk, Ade-Lee explores how soft skills like empathy, curiosity, and integrity have become creativity’s secret weapons in a world obsessed with optics.
Expect candid stories, uncomfortable truths, and practical takeaways on how to lead, collaborate, and create without losing yourself to the performance.
It’s a talk for anyone tired of playing the part and ready to bring real creativity back into the work.
About Ade-Lee Adebiyi
Ade-Lee is a designer, speaker, and facilitator at ParentPay. With over a decade of experience across SaaS and education, he’s worked on everything from data storytelling and design systems to brand transformations and design ops.
Ade-Lee has spoken at 30+ conferences, including TEDx, UX Scotland, and Design Matters. He’s the creator of Make It Pop, a design-thinking game used by teams at companies like Google and Microsoft, and occasionally gets nerdy enough to write manga about design.
Speakers & Workshop Hosts
Take a look at some of the other speakers recently announced for #DIBI2026
