Billie Jordan

About Billie

Billie Jordan is the founder of the Hip Op-eration Crew — a hip hop dance group of 27 members aged 65 to 98, based on Waiheke Island off the east coast of New Zealand. After surviving an abusive childhood and the deadly Christchurch Earthquake of 2011, Jordan used those experiences as a catalyst to ignite the potential of senior citizens in her community. With no background in dance, hip hop or working with the elderly — and a team whose average age was 80, many of them blind, deaf, disabled or living with dementia — she set an audacious goal: to get her crew to the World Hip Hop Championships in Las Vegas within eight months. They made it. And in doing so, they entered the Guinness Book of World Records as the oldest dance crew on the planet.

Jordan was awarded a Queen's Honour in 2016, named New Zealand Woman of the Year in 2016/2017, and won the New Zealander of the Year award in the Local Hero category in 2015. Her story is the subject of an award-winning feature documentary film, Hip Hop-eration, which has screened in cinemas worldwide, with Hollywood now planning a blockbuster adaptation. She has delivered a TEDx Talk to critical acclaim and has spoken at prestigious events across the USA, Scotland, Canada, New Zealand and Australia.

Jordan's presentation is built around leadership, mindset and the art of getting people — even those who resist, doubt themselves, or simply do not believe — to achieve something extraordinary together. She connects with audiences through authenticity, vulnerability and genuine humour. Expect laugh-out-loud moments and a few tears. She is a speaker no one forgets.