Casandra Brené Brown PhD LMSW (born November 18, 1965) is a research professor at the University of Houston where she holds the Huffington Foundation – Brené Brown Endowed Chair at The Graduate College of Social Work.

She has spent her career studying courage, vulnerability, shame, and empathy and is the author of five #1 New York Times best sellers: The Gifts of Imperfection, Daring Greatly, Rising Strong, Braving the Wilderness, and her latest book, Dare to Lead, which is the culmination of a seven-year study on courage and leadership.

Brown's TED talk – The Power of Vulnerability – is one of the top five most viewed TED talks in the world with over 35 million views. She is also the first person to have a filmed talk available on Netflix. The Call to Courage special debuted on the streaming service on April 19, 2019.

Casandra Brené Brown was born on November 18, 1965 in San Antonio, Texas, the daughter of Charles Arthur Brown and Casandra Deanne Rogers.^[1] She spent a formative period in New Orleans, Louisiana.^[2] Brown was baptized in the Episcopal church and then later brought up Catholic.^[3] She left the church for two decades, and later returned to it with her husband and children.

She completed her Bachelor of Social Work (BSW) at the University of Texas at Austin in 1995, followed by a Master of Social Work (MSW) in 1996.^[4] She received a PhD from the Graduate College of Social Work at the University of Houston in 2002.^[5]

Brown began her career as a research professor at the University of Houston Graduate College of Social Work.^[6] Her research focuses on authentic leadership and wholeheartedness in families, schools, and organizations. She presented a 2012 TED talk and two 2010 TEDx talks. Brown's TED talk "The Power of Vulnerability" is one of the top five most viewed TED talks, with over 40 million views.^{[7][8][9][10][11][12]}

Brown is the author of I Thought It Was Just Me (but it isn't): Telling the Truth About Perfectionism, Inadequacy, and Power (Penguin/Gotham, 2007), The Gifts of Imperfection: Letting Go of Who We Think We Should Be and Embracing Who We Are (Hazelden, 2010), Daring Greatly: How the Courage to Be Vulnerable Transforms the Way We Live, Love, Parent, and Lead (Gotham, 2012), Rising Strong: The Reckoning. The Rumble. The Revolution. (Spiegel & Grau, 2015), Braving the Wilderness: The Quest for True Belonging, The Courage to Stand Alone (2017) and Dare to Lead (2018). Her articles have appeared in many national newspapers.^[13]

In March 2013, she appeared on Super Soul Sunday talking with Oprah Winfrey about her new book, Daring Greatly.^[14] The title of the book comes from Theodore Roosevelt's speech "Citizenship in a Republic", which is also referred as "The Man in the Arena" speech, given at the Sorbonne in Paris, France, on April 23, 1910.^[15]

Brown is the chief executive officer for The Daring Way, a training and certification program for helping professionals who want to facilitate her work on vulnerability, courage, shame, and empathy.^[16]

Brown lives in Houston, Texas, with her husband, Steve Alley,^[17] and their two children.^[5]

Houston Woman Magazine voted Brown one of Houston's most influential women of 2009.^[18] She has received numerous teaching awards including the Graduate College of Social Work's Outstanding Faculty Award.^[19]

In 2016, the Huffington Foundation honored Brown by pledging $2 million over four years to fund the Brené Brown Endowed Chair in the Graduate College of Social Work at the University of Houston. This will provide resources to expand Brown's research, as a greater number of social work students pursuing training in grounded theory methodology will be trained in her research on vulnerability, courage, shame, and empathy.^[20]