INTRODUCTORY STATEMENT
Josh Basile helps organizations remove barriers, expand opportunities, and turn their accessibility commitments into meaningful action.
As a C4–5 quadriplegic, attorney, nonprofit founder, and nationally recognized disability leader, Josh brings more than two decades of lived and professional experience to conversations about leadership, accessibility, employment, innovation, talent, and organizational change.
BIOGRAPHY
Josh Basile, Esq., is a nationally recognized disability leader, attorney, entrepreneur, and sought-after speaker who has spent more than two decades expanding opportunities for people with disabilities.
At age 18, Josh sustained a life-changing spinal cord injury that left him paralyzed below his shoulders. Rather than allowing that moment to define the limits of his future, he built a career devoted to expanding what is possible—for himself, for the disability community, and for organizations seeking to remove barriers and create greater opportunities.
Josh is an attorney with The Spinal Cord Injury Law Firm, where he helps people with catastrophic injuries and their families navigate life-changing legal challenges. He also serves as Community Relations Manager at accessiBe, building relationships throughout the disability community and helping connect lived experiences with the company’s accessibility work, employees, and leadership.
Josh is the founder and executive director of Determined2Heal and SPINALpedia, a video-based mentoring platform containing more than 45,000 videos. Through these organizations, he has helped thousands of people with spinal cord injuries and their families access mentorship, resources, and a community grounded in knowledge and possibility.
His leadership has been recognized through his selection to the Forbes Accessibility 100 in 2025 and Forbes Accessibility 200 in 2026, receipt of the 2022 Neilsen Foundation Visionary Prize, and induction into the National Disability Mentoring Coalition’s Mentoring Hall of Fame.
Josh brings a rare combination of lived experience, legal knowledge, nonprofit leadership, corporate engagement, and disability-community credibility to the stage. His presentations move beyond awareness alone. He helps audiences understand how leadership decisions, workplace culture, accessibility, and technology affect people with disabilities—and how organizations can translate that understanding into practical action, stronger performance, and expanded opportunity.
Through candid storytelling, humor, and practical guidance, Josh challenges audiences to rethink assumptions, recognize untapped talent, and build environments where people with disabilities can contribute, advance, lead, and thrive.
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SPEAKING TOPICS
Included by not limited to:
- BUILDING WORKPLACES WHERE EVERYONE CAN CONTRIBUTE: Many organizations want to create workplaces where every employee can succeed but struggle to turn that commitment into everyday practice. Josh helps audiences understand where barriers continue to appear—in workplace culture, technology, communication, hiring, advancement, and leadership—and how organizations can begin removing them. Audience takeaways include:
- Recognizing barriers that may be invisible to decision-makers
- Understanding the business and human value of accessible workplaces
- Creating cultures in which employees feel comfortable requesting what they need
- Incorporating disability perspectives into decisions from the beginning
- Turning organizational commitments into practical and measurable action
- THE UNTAPPED POWER OF DISABILITY TALENT: People with disabilities bring valuable experience, creativity, adaptability, and problem-solving skills to the workplace, yet they remain significantly underrepresented and underemployed. Josh examines the assumptions and systems that prevent employers from fully accessing this talent. Audience takeaways include:
- Recognizing disability as a source of talent, leadership, and innovation
- Improving recruitment, onboarding, advancement, and retention
- Understanding the importance of accessibility and workplace accommodations
- Creating pathways for employees with disabilities to grow into leadership
- Building stronger organizations by expanding who has an opportunity to contribute
- FINDING AND UNLEASHING YOUR SUPERPOWERS: Everyone possesses a unique combination of strengths, experiences, and perspectives that can create value for others. Josh helps audiences identify their own “superpowers,” develop confidence in what makes them different, and find meaningful ways to put those strengths into action. Drawing from his experiences as a quadriplegic, attorney, entrepreneur, nonprofit founder, mentor, and father, Josh demonstrates that our greatest strengths are often developed through the challenges we never expected to face. Audience takeaways include:
- Identifying the strengths hidden within personal experiences and challenges
- Recognizing how differences can become valuable leadership assets
- Developing confidence in one’s individual abilities and perspective
- Creating opportunities to use personal strengths to empower others
- Building a life and career grounded in purpose, contribution, and impact
- THE POWER OF PERSPECTIVE: MOVING FORWARD AND OVERCOMING BARRIERS: The barriers we encounter can shape our experiences, but they do not have to determine the direction of our lives. Josh shares how perspective can help people respond to uncertainty, navigate setbacks, and continue moving forward—even when the path ahead looks completely different from what they originally imagined.This presentation combines personal storytelling with practical lessons about adaptability, problem-solving, relationships, and the choices that help us regain momentum. Josh encourages audiences to acknowledge difficult circumstances honestly while recognizing the possibilities that may still exist. Audience takeaways include:
- Understanding how perspective influences decisions and possibilities
- Learning to focus energy on what can be influenced or changed
- Responding to barriers with creativity, adaptability, and determination
- Recognizing when to ask for help and build a supportive team
- Moving forward without minimizing the reality of difficult circumstances
- FROM LIVED EXPERIENCE TO LEADERSHIP: Josh shares how a life-changing spinal cord injury at age 18 shaped his journey as an attorney, nonprofit founder, mentor, advocate, corporate professional, and father. His story is not simply about overcoming adversity—it is about developing the agency, relationships, and sense of purpose needed to create change. Audience takeaways include:
- Responding to uncertainty with purpose and adaptability
- Turning personal experience into meaningful leadership
- Building relationships that expand individual and collective impact
- Recognizing that leadership can begin before someone has a formal title
- Using lived experience to improve decisions, organizations, and communities
- USING YOUR VOICE TO CHANGE SYSTEMS AND LIVES: Josh has spent more than two decades advocating for himself and others—from mentoring families and building disability organizations to practicing law and helping influence policies and organizational practices. He shows how individual self-advocacy can grow into collective action and lasting systemic change. Audience takeaways include:
- Finding and confidently using one’s voice
- Building coalitions around shared goals
- Moving from identifying problems to advancing solutions
- Using personal stories strategically to influence decision-makers
- Turning advocacy into practical changes that improve people’s lives
- ACCESSIBILITY, TECHNOLOGY, AND THE FUTURE OF OPPORTUNITY: Technology can create unprecedented independence and opportunity, but inaccessible design can exclude people just as quickly. Josh draws on his daily use of assistive technology and his professional work within the accessibility field to make digital accessibility tangible, practical, and relevant. He helps organizations understand that accessibility is not simply a technical or legal responsibility. It is an opportunity to reach more customers, empower employees, improve products, strengthen innovation, and build better digital experiences. Audience takeaways include:
- Understanding how people with disabilities interact with technology
- Recognizing accessibility as an essential part of innovation and good design
- Involving people with disabilities throughout design and decision-making
- Building digital experiences that reach more employees and customers
- Treating accessibility as an ongoing business practice rather than a one-time project
Book with Josh Basile, Esq.
WASHINGTON POST ARTICLES
- Front Page — “A Spirit the Waves Couldn’t Break”
- Front Page — “The Way Forward”
- Featured — “The Gifts and Challenges of Being a Quadriplegic Father”
SPEAKING FORMATS
Josh is available for:
- Corporate keynotes
- Leadership meetings and executive conversations
- Employee resource group events
- Disability Employment Awareness Month programming
- Fireside chats and moderated conversations
- Panel discussions
- Accessibility and workplace-opportunity workshops
- Legal and professional conferences
- Virtual and in-person events
BOOKING DESCRIPTION
Book Josh Basile for an engaging, candid, and action-oriented conversation about leadership, accessibility, workplace opportunity, innovation, overcoming barriers, and the power of lived experience.