Dr. Andrea Wojnicki is an executive communication coach with a doctorate from Harvard Business School and the author of "A Simple Way to Introduce Yourself," one of the most downloaded HBR articles of all time. She coaches executives at Deloitte, JPMorgan, MasterCard, EY, and PwC, and teaches in the MBA program and executive education at the University of Toronto.

• How does the Present-Past-Future framework help you answer "tell me about yourself," and what should you say in the first 30 seconds?
• Of the Four P's of vocal delivery (Pitch, Pace, Projection, Pausing), where do speakers tend to slip, and what's the fastest fix?
• How does imposter syndrome affect leaders and coaches, and how can you turn it into a strength?
• What does "being yourself on purpose" mean for your personal brand?
• How do you find the middle of the Confidence Continuum, between under-confidence and over-confidence?

Dr. Andrea Wojnicki is an executive communication coach with a doctorate from Harvard Business School and the author of "A Simple Way to Introduce Yourself," one of the most downloaded HBR articles of all time. She coaches executives at Deloitte, JPMorgan, MasterCard, EY, and PwC, and teaches in the MBA program and executive education at the University of Toronto. She writes for Inc. Magazine and Fast Company. Her work centers on what she calls "being yourself on purpose," a research-backed approach to personal branding and communicating with confidence, and her book on the same comes out Spring 2027.

www.talkabouttalk.com

If you have enjoyed this episode, subscribe to our podcast on iTunes. We would love for you to leave a review.

The EEC podcasts are sponsored by MKB Excellent Executive Coaching, which helps you get from where you are to where you want to be with customized leadership and coaching development programs. MKB Excellent Executive Coaching offers leadership development programs to generate action, learning, and change that is aligned with your authentic self and values. Transform your dreams into reality and invest in yourself by scheduling a discovery session with Dr. Katrina Burrus, MCC, to reach your goals.

Your host is Dr. Katrina Burrus, MCC, founder and general manager of Excellent Executive Coaching, a company that specializes in leadership development.

Kiersten Farmer is a Data Strategist, Organizational Excellence Coach, and Managing Director of DataCivic. With nearly two decades of experience in applied data practices, performance management, and organizational evolution, she helps leaders answer the defining question of the AI age: What makes me necessary?

• What does an "AI identity crisis" actually look like inside an organization, and how do you know when you're in one?
• Why isn't upskilling and learning AI tools the answer on its own?
• Does the AI identity crisis show up differently in government, mission-driven organizations, and the private sector?
• What does a leader who is confident amidst data and AI look like in practice, and how is that different from someone who's just comfortable with technology?
• What does it cost an organization to ignore this problem?

Kiersten Farmer is a Data Strategist, Organizational Excellence Coach, and Managing Director of DataCivic. With nearly two decades of experience in applied data practices, performance management, and organizational evolution, she helps leaders answer the defining question of the AI age: What makes me necessary? A CBAP-certified data scientist, Ph.D. candidate, and dual master's degree holder in Technology Entrepreneurship and Public Administration, Kiersten is a published author and national speaker. She is known for helping organizations preserve their competitive edge, build leadership confidence with data and AI, and lead boldly through uncertainty with clarity and confidence.

www.datacivic.com

If you have enjoyed this episode, subscribe to our podcast on iTunes. We would love for you to leave a review.

The EEC podcasts are sponsored by MKB Excellent Executive Coaching, which helps you get from where you are to where you want to be with customized leadership and coaching development programs. MKB Excellent Executive Coaching offers leadership development programs to generate action, learning, and change that is aligned with your authentic self and values. Transform your dreams into reality and invest in yourself by scheduling a discovery session with Dr. Katrina Burrus, MCC, to reach your goals.

Your host is Dr. Katrina Burrus, MCC, founder and general manager of Excellent Executive Coaching, a company that specializes in leadership development.

Michael Wood is a Consciousness Awareness Professional and the creator of the Learn To Love Being You program, a 10-week journey designed to help people break free from anxiety, self-doubt, and the emotional spirals that keep them stuck.

• How can we rewire subconscious beliefs formed in childhood without years of therapy?
• What actually heals trauma, beyond talk therapy alone?
• What is the shift from the Fear Bucket to the Love Bucket, and how can brain chemistry help us escape anxiety on demand?
• How can we quiet the mental chatter and access our intuition, even if we "can't meditate"?
• Why is forgiveness not a weakness, but your escape from someone else's prison?

Michael is a Consciousness Awareness Professional and the creator of the Learn To Love Being You program, a 10-week journey designed to help people break free from anxiety, self-doubt, and the emotional spirals that keep them stuck. After rebuilding his own life from the inside out, Michael has dedicated himself to helping others rewrite the beliefs that shape their reality and reconnect with the part of themselves they forgot they had.

As COO of Jarrett Companies, Michael has led hundreds of high-stakes, emotionally charged conversations—experiences that shaped his direct, no-nonsense approach to personal transformation. He blends spiritual insight, grounded psychology, and a goofy sense of humor to help people open up, relax, and finally breathe.

Whether he's teaching breathwork in a maximum-security prison, building businesses that actually uplift their people, or guiding someone through a major breakthrough, Michael's mission is simple: help people remember who they are, unlock what they're capable of, and actually enjoy being themselves again.

www.learntolovebeingyou.com

If you have enjoyed this episode, subscribe to our podcast on iTunes. We would love for you to leave a review.

The EEC podcasts are sponsored by MKB Excellent Executive Coaching, which helps you get from where you are to where you want to be with customized leadership and coaching development programs. MKB Excellent Executive Coaching offers leadership development programs to generate action, learning, and change that is aligned with your authentic self and values. Transform your dreams into reality and invest in yourself by scheduling a discovery session with Dr. Katrina Burrus, MCC, to reach your goals.

Your host is Dr. Katrina Burrus, MCC, founder and general manager of Excellent Executive Coaching, a company that specializes in leadership development.

With over 25 years of experience, Kristina Katayama is the founder and lead consultant of Be Possible, which supports discerning, legacy-minded leaders across public, nonprofit, and private organizations who feel called to effect social change beyond their job description.

• Why do you say that many leaders do not actually have a conflict problem, but a relational culture problem?
• What does a conflict-capable organization look like in practice?
• How does nervous-system awareness change the way we lead, coach, and navigate tension?
• What can leaders do when trust is frayed, communication is breaking down, or people are either checked out or reactive?
• How can executive coaches help leaders shift from managing symptoms to building the conditions for genuine collaboration?

With over 25 years of experience, Kristina Katayama is the founder and lead consultant of Be Possible, which supports discerning, legacy-minded leaders across public, nonprofit, and private organizations who feel called to effect social change beyond their job description. Our work helps leaders and teams transform conflict into collaboration and operationalize values through nervous-system-wise, relational practices in everyday interactions. Using an appreciative approach, we create action-learning processes that build relational accountability, develop agency at every level, and embed scalable micro-practices to strengthen trust, vitality, and collaboration. Grounded in appreciative inquiry, adaptive leadership, and restorative practices, our approach integrates organizational change, leadership development, and nervous-system-wise dynamics. We help organizations transform patterns of passivity and reactivity under tension into cultures rooted in grounded engagement, collective ownership, and vitality. Over time, organizations shift from conflict-avoidant, hero-based firefighting to conflict-capable human systems that can navigate complexity and thrive.

If you have enjoyed this episode, subscribe to our podcast on iTunes. We would love for you to leave a review.

The EEC podcasts are sponsored by MKB Excellent Executive Coaching, which helps you get from where you are to where you want to be with customized leadership and coaching development programs. MKB Excellent Executive Coaching offers leadership development programs to generate action, learning, and change that is aligned with your authentic self and values. Transform your dreams into reality and invest in yourself by scheduling a discovery session with Dr. Katrina Burrus, MCC, to reach your goals.

Your host is Dr. Katrina Burrus, MCC, founder and general manager of Excellent Executive Coaching, a company that specializes in leadership development.

Nate Amidon is a former U.S. Air Force combat pilot turned CEO and founder of Form 100 Consulting. He helps enterprise technology and program leaders create alignment, drive predictable execution, and implement AI with real ROI.

• You have a military background; what leadership principles from that experience apply directly to business and technology teams?
• How do you help people in the military convert to the business world?
• What are the biggest mistakes leaders make when trying to implement AI in their organizations?
• How can leaders create clarity in complex programs where multiple teams and stakeholders are involved?
• Why do so many agile programs struggle with predictability, even when teams are performing well?
• You talk a lot about alignment; what does alignment actually look like inside a large enterprise program?

Nate Amidon is a former U.S. Air Force combat pilot turned CEO and founder of Form 100 Consulting. He helps enterprise technology and program leaders create alignment, drive predictable execution, and implement AI with real ROI. Drawing on military precision and hard-won civilian experience, Nate specializes in cutting through complexity to deliver clarity, for teams, leaders, and organizations navigating large-scale change.

If you have enjoyed this episode, subscribe to our podcast on iTunes. We would love for you to leave a review.

The EEC podcasts are sponsored by MKB Excellent Executive Coaching, which helps you get from where you are to where you want to be with customized leadership and coaching development programs. MKB Excellent Executive Coaching offers leadership development programs to generate action, learning, and change that is aligned with your authentic self and values. Transform your dreams into reality and invest in yourself by scheduling a discovery session with Dr. Katrina Burrus, MCC, to reach your goals.

Your host is Dr. Katrina Burrus, MCC, founder and general manager of Excellent Executive Coaching, a company that specializes in leadership development.

Dr. Alexis Kennedy built her career at the intersection of law and forensic psychology. With both a PhD in Forensic Psychology and a JD, she spent decades researching child abuse, sexual violence, and human trafficking. After years of absorbing the cumulative weight of that work, she experienced firsthand what she had only studied in others: burnout.

• You built a career studying trauma, and then burned out. What did that actually look like?
• Corporate leaders are often celebrated for their ability to push through. From a neuroscience standpoint, what is actually happening in the brain and body when someone has been in that "push through" mode for too long?
• You work with judges, executives, and first responders. What do these groups have in common when it comes to why they resist asking for help? W
• You have said that protecting yourself is not a weakness; it is the strategy. For a skeptical executive who sees self-care as soft, what does the science actually say about the cost of not protecting yourself?
• Your approach is specifically designed for people who are too busy or too skeptical to slow down. What does an evidence-based recovery strategy look?

Dr. Alexis Kennedy built her career at the intersection of law and forensic psychology. With both a PhD in Forensic Psychology and a JD, she spent decades researching child abuse, sexual violence, and human trafficking. After years of absorbing the cumulative weight of that work, she experienced firsthand what she had only studied in others: burnout.

That turning point became her catalyst. She redirected her research expertise toward understanding why driven, accomplished professionals hit the wall and what the science says about getting back up. She now works with the audiences least likely to ask for help: judges, lawyers, executives, firefighters, and first responders who are too busy or too skeptical to slow down.

Her approach is practical and evidence-based. She translates neuroscience and stress physiology into concrete strategies that high-performing professionals will actually use.

Dr. Kennedy is a sought-after speaker, researcher, and advisor who has worked inside courtrooms, fire stations, law firms, and corporate boardrooms across North America. Her message is simple: protecting yourself is not a weakness. It is the strategy.

If you have enjoyed this episode, subscribe to our podcast on iTunes. We would love for you to leave a review.

The EEC podcasts are sponsored by MKB Excellent Executive Coaching, which helps you get from where you are to where you want to be with customized leadership and coaching development programs. MKB Excellent Executive Coaching offers leadership development programs to generate action, learning, and change that is aligned with your authentic self and values. Transform your dreams into reality and invest in yourself by scheduling a discovery session with Dr. Katrina Burrus, MCC, to reach your goals.

Your host is Dr. Katrina Burrus, MCC, founder and general manager of Excellent Executive Coaching, a company that specializes in leadership development.

Erin Hedinger is an LCSW with more than a decade of expertise in integrative psychospiritual and humanistic modalities and an undergraduate degree in Religious Studies. She started her practice, EH Therapy LLC, in 2019 and has since curated a holistic approach that combines evidence-based treatment models with the timeless wisdom of ancient myths, rituals, symbols, and storytelling.

• You created a Modern Day Hero's Journey- a holistic model for healing and ecstatic living. Can you tell listeners why you think this model is needed at this time and what inspired you to create it?
• At the heart of your model is a pretty bold claim: that healing and ecstatic living are not two separate journeys but one. Can you unpack that for us?
• You bring this to life through the metaphor of an inner-world theater. Can you take us on a tour of that inner world and help listeners understand what is actually happening inside them? And walk us through the model's different phases?
• You write about the Fall as a universal human experience. Why is understanding our own falls so central to this journey, and what role does shame play in keeping us stuck?
• So what does it actually look like when someone does the work and steps out of survival into what you call ecstatic living?

Erin Hedinger is an LCSW with more than a decade of expertise in integrative psychospiritual and humanistic modalities and an undergraduate degree in Religious Studies. She started her practice, EH Therapy LLC, in 2019 and has since curated a holistic approach that combines evidence-based treatment models with the timeless wisdom of ancient myths, rituals, symbols, and storytelling.

At the heart of Erin's work is a belief that healing and living fully are not two separate journeys, but one. Her framework guides clients inward, helping them process grief, trauma, and unmet needs, while simultaneously reclaiming the hidden desires and gifts within. The goal, she believes, is not simply to survive or merely exist, but to build the most authentic, ecstatic life possible from the inside out.

Her therapeutic approach is the foundation of her recently completed book, Your Modern-Day Hero's Journey: A Guide to Ecstatic Living, a transformative guide that weaves archetypal storytelling with leading psychological research to help readers heal and thrive.

Beyond her practice, Erin has been a member of the Amherst Writers & Artists since 2012 and became a certified writing group leader in 2016. When not working with clients, Erin can be found practicing yoga, exploring the gorgeous wooded trails of Morristown, New Jersey, engaging in creative writing, spending time with loved ones, or indulging in glorious works of fiction!

If you have enjoyed this episode, subscribe to our podcast on iTunes. We would love for you to leave a review.

The EEC podcasts are sponsored by MKB Excellent Executive Coaching, which helps you get from where you are to where you want to be with customized leadership and coaching development programs. MKB Excellent Executive Coaching offers leadership development programs to generate action, learning, and change that is aligned with your authentic self and values. Transform your dreams into reality and invest in yourself by scheduling a discovery session with Dr. Katrina Burrus, MCC, to reach your goals.

Your host is Dr. Katrina Burrus, MCC, founder and general manager of Excellent Executive Coaching, a company that specializes in leadership development.

Pat has authored two cookbooks: Whisk Upon a Star and Mouth of the South. Her latest book: Hurdles in a Girdle...Holding Life Together When You're Bursting at the Seams was published by the same group that produced Jack Canfield's books, known for the Chicken Soup for the Soul series.

• How did you get interested in hypnotherapy?
• What is the difference between hypnosis and hypnotherapy?
• Why do willpower and motivation fail at the conscious level, and how does hypnotherapy address that?
• What role does the subconscious mind play in our ability to stay motivated or consistent?
• Can you share an example where hypnotherapy helped someone succeed where willpower alone didn't?
• How does hypnotherapy help people stay inspired? Can you describe the process?

Pat Allen went into real estate and opened Pat Allen Realty Group fourteen years ago, where she consistently ranks among the top 1.5% of brokers nationwide.

Pat has authored two cookbooks: Whisk Upon a Star and Mouth of the South. Her latest book: Hurdles in a Girdle...Holding Life Together When You're Bursting at the Seams was published by the same group that produced Jack Canfield's books, known for the Chicken Soup for the Soul series and The Success Principles. Jack endorsed Pat's book on the cover.

Pat is dedicated, determined, and driven, and her success is due to the fact that she always makes it about her client...not herself. She felt compelled to help other women find love, purpose, and joy in their lives.

"My message is that we should never stay stuck in a bad marriage/relationship or an unfulfilled job. Fear holds us back from a life of joy, love, and purpose. If children are involved, thinking it's better to stay in a bad marriage is wrong…they will be impacted the rest of their lives."

If you have enjoyed this episode, subscribe to our podcast on iTunes. We would love for you to leave a review.

The EEC podcasts are sponsored by MKB Excellent Executive Coaching, which helps you get from where you are to where you want to be with customized leadership and coaching development programs. MKB Excellent Executive Coaching offers leadership development programs to generate action, learning, and change that is aligned with your authentic self and values. Transform your dreams into reality and invest in yourself by scheduling a discovery session with Dr. Katrina Burrus, MCC, to reach your goals.

Your host is Dr. Katrina Burrus, MCC, founder and general manager of Excellent Executive Coaching, a company that specializes in leadership development.