Coaching and Facilitation

With Babs Kelly

Being Courageous

Being courageous is what moves us from getting life done as though it is a bullet point on a to-do list to meeting each moment with the attention it deserves. Honest and generous attention.

When we are courageous, we create healthy environments in which we and the people around us are invited in and given space to show up with the best of human qualities such as curiosity, kindness, compassion, creativity, generosity, inventiveness, honesty, respect, wisdom, and even more courage. We show up with commitment to a purpose that is bigger than ourselves. We show up for the success of others and the impact of the organization.

Being courageous at work humanizes our conversations, decisions, and actions as well as our skills and practices such as strategic planning, business and service initiatives, change management, and leading and supporting people. When we are courageous, the work we do is more enriching and effective for everyone — for us, the people we work with, and the communities we serve.

This project is for courageous leaders. Courageous leaders who are taking the first steps on their leadership journey, courageous leaders who are exploring and transitioning to what is next, and courageous leaders who are looking back on a long road and want to keep going.

Coaching

My whole-person coaching method is about discovering or reconnecting with what is important to you and how you want to show up in the world.

Whether you are thinking about preparing for your next position, retirement, or big changes at work for yourself or for the team, you don’t have to do it alone, I am here for you.

Just for You Coaching

Join me in one-on-one sessions where we will get curious about your priorities, values, goals, needs, wants, and the next steps on your leadership journey.

My coaching expertise includes:

Transitioning into a leadership role
Developing and living a leadership vision
Leading culture change
Having strategic influence and impact
Managing priorities and time
Leading and engaging teams
Supporting psychological safety
Strengthening strategic thinking and problem solving
Cultivating focus and attention
Navigating life and work responsibilities
Setting boundaries
Shifting from stress and overwhelm to confidence and ease
Nurturing healthy and wise habits
Unleashing your creativity
Letting go of expectations and limiting beliefs
Ending inner-critics and imposter syndrome
Finding ease, satisfaction, and even joy in leadership
Changing career priorities
Preparing for and adjusting to retirement

Ask me about the 10 session Leadership Journey coaching package!

Just for You sessions are via the Courageous Leaders Project Zoom account.

Project Coaching

Leadership driven projects need momentum and accountability from start to finish. When they don’t, change and innovation gets stuck in a limbo that damages the credibility of the team and harms the impact and reputation of the organization.

I offer a unique coaching service where I work with the project leader or team to bring complex and time-sensitive projects to successful completion.

You are the experts, the drivers, and the owners of the project.

As a coach, I:

Provide support and an accountability framework for achieving the project’s
goals.
Facilitate a project approach and process that brings ease to your work so that your project vision, inquiry, ideas, strategies, research, and engagement, have the space, structure, and energy for success.
Encourage proven project management practices and recommend resources and
tools as appropriate for the project’s efficiency and effectiveness.

Additionally, I am available to facilitate stakeholder consultations, focus groups, and staff gatherings that result in organizations being better informed and better prepared for change, innovation, and uncertainty.

Project Coaching is available in person or via the Courageous Leaders Project Zoom account.

Cohort Coaching

Imagine you and four to six of your colleagues and friends joining me, your guide and coach, in a confidential online group experience devoted to:

Setting and celebrating professional aspirations and goals
Generously and kindly being accountable and supportive
Cultivating and nurturing the habits, beliefs, and leadership stories that will energize you and your work

You set the pace and the schedule (one to ten 90 minute sessions) and I’ll be there for you.

Cohort Coaching sessions are via the Courageous Leaders Project Zoom account.

Facilitation

As a facilitator I design and host gatherings and processes where people connect with each other and ideas, think bigger and more strategically, create meaning and change, and embrace responsibility and accountability.

Leadership Team Retreats

I work with leadership teams that want to make a difference with why and how they do their work. If your team is ready to go big and beautiful (and really isn’t this why we get up in the morning?), then let’s talk.

My leadership team facilitation expertise includes:

Building and working with a values-driven team vision and expectations
Embracing commitment and accountability
Developing and sustaining psychological safety
Thinking and behaving strategically
Solving problems smartly and creatively
Being healthy and wise in leading organization-wide well-being
Hosting and participating in effective and meaningful meetings and conversations
Leading culture change
Shifting from stress and overwhelm to confidence and ease

Leadership Team Retreats are hosted as in-person events. Optional post-session check-ins may be arranged via the Courageous Leaders Project Zoom account.

Governance Team Retreats

How a board works together and works with the CEO or executive director (ED) sets the culture for and shapes the success of not-for-profits, community-based organizations, and public libraries.

This is too important to leave to chance.

My governance expertise includes:

Sharing a governance team vision and expectations (the team being the board and CEO / ED)
Building trust as a governance team with role clarity, transparency and accountability
Embracing and updating your strategic decisions and plans in times of change or uncertainty
Chairing and participating in fiduciary, strategic, and generative discussions
Having influence and impact
Leading and governing organizational culture and success
Board assessments and development plans

Governance Team Retreats are hosted as in-person events.

If you are a board chair interested in working with a coach with governance and leadership development expertise, I’m here for you with my Just for You coaching services available via Courageous Leaders Project Zoom account.

360 Leadership Reviews

360 Leadership reviews are often perceived as contentious, stressful, and best to avoid. Work with me to experience a supportive and collaborative process from start to finish.

I offer a fresh take on the 360 leadership review process where trust is strengthened,
friendliness and good intentions drive the process, and the goal for everyone involved is to build understanding, ongoing open communication, professional growth, and strong leadership.

The most effective 360 reviews and feedback processes and approaches for CEOs, executive directors (EDs), and library directors are developed and implemented with their and their board or employers’ needs and input.

360 Leadership Reviews are facilitated remotely or in person.

About Me

My life includes two kind-hearted, wildly smart, and good-humoured adult sons, a beautiful and loving husband, and a variety of cats and dogs that give me daily reminders that walks, play, paying attention to the little things, and just sitting doing nothing are part of the good life.

Some of my details include that I have been a successful public sector senior manager and not-for-profit executive director. I have an MLIS and an MBA. The MLIS makes me a librarian and information seeker — I can’t help but seek out, make sense of, and share information relevant to my work. The MBA experience honed my skills and smarts for forging creative and innovative paths for healthy, wise, and successful leadership and work dynamics. In addition to coaching, I have pursued training and certification in skills and knowledge areas that bring depth and meaning to my work.

I’m always exploring and learning, and I share my thoughts on what I encounter at the Courageous Leaders Project newsletter.

Influences on My Work

Brené Brown. Brené’s gift of the words “strong backs, soft fronts and wild hearts” and her compendium of emotions and experiences in Atlas of the Heart re-energized my work in leadership and organizational development. Work with me, and you will most likely hear me giving a nod to Brené as I ask, “what is the story we are telling ourselves?”.

Christina Feldman. Christina’s teachings at Bodhi College on recognizing patterns and the suffering they cause has led me to evaluate and better understand my own life and have provided an additional generous and kind lens for supporting leaders, teams, and organizations with their own growth.

Edgar Schein. Edgar’s works, particularly Organizational Culture and Leadership and Humble Inquiry were among my first leadership and organizational development reads and and laid the foundation for how I ask questions, see artifacts, poke at espoused values, and listen for underlying assumptions.

Simon Sinek. Thanks to Simon and his The Optimism Company, my work always starts with “why?”.

Margaret Wheatley. Margaret first caught my interest in the early 2000s when a colleague recommended her work on complex problems and deep inquiry. I don’t know exactly when or where I encountered her wisdom on giving preference to curiosity over certitude, but it is now one of my guiding principles.

My Approach

As a coach and a facilitator, my role is to hold a safe and confidential space, to respond professionally and wisely to needs and goals, and to generously support accountability and success.

I approach my work with friendship and positive regard and believe that each of us has experiences, strengths, hurts, resiliency, and beauty that we bring to our courageous leadership work.

As said by the Zen monk and teacher Shunryu Suzuki,

Each of you is perfect the way you are . . . and you can use a little improvement.

Through committed study and practice, my approach to coaching is aligned with the ICF Core Competencies. My facilitation training is endorsed by the International Association of Facilitators.

I offer a complimentary 30-minute consultation, via Zoom, to answer your questions and map out some ideas for how we might begin working together.

Appreciations

“I’d like to have Babs sit in the corner of my office where I could turn to her anytime I want for an uplifting chat, wise counsel, and mentorship.”
L., Public Sector CEO

“Our weekend retreat with Babs was magical. We had been through a tough time and were struggling with trust and safety. Babs held space and guided us through the conversations and healing in a way that was more than we could have imagined and exactly what we needed.”
G., Executive Director and D., Board Chair, Non-profit Organization

“As a long-time city councillor, I have attended many governance workshops and retreats and this one with Babs was by far the most enjoyable, time-worthy, and inspiring. She has energy and calmness, knows how to read and manage the room, and expertly facilitates ideas, participation, and respect. In my experience, this is a rare combination and Babs is a rare being.”
M., City Councillor, Metro Vancouver

“Babs is extraordinarily skilled. My coaching sessions with her are the best investment in my career and in my self-care.”
N., Tech Industry Executive

“Many of our board members were familiar with strategic planning at their own organizations and were feeling a little jaded and uncertain about being part of planning process that felt empty or performative. As well, our staff and community members were hesitant and nervous about how they might participate and if they would feel out of place. Working with, by, and for community is critical to how we do our work. Babs immediately understood what that would mean for our strategic planning and worked with us on designing an inclusive and relaxed process. Her way of holding space and connecting people and ideas resulted in a freaking awesome gathering and strategic plan. She’s freaking awesome.”
T., Board Chair, and B., Executive Director, Non-profit Organization

“Babs doesn’t tell you what to do, she asks questions and gives homework that you do or don’t do according to how committed you are to yourself. If you are ready to take responsibility for how you show up as a leader, to reach higher and to go deeper, I highly recommend working with her.”
L., Forestry Executive

“We knew that Babs was who we wanted to guide our retreat when she asked us how we wanted to feel at our retreat and what difference it would make to us afterwards. The time together felt uniquely ours and re-energized our clarity and purpose in our teamwork. We love Babs!”
P., CEO and D., Executive Team Member, Public Sector

“She’s like a fairy godmother of sparkling energy, deep wisdom, boundless warmth, and wicked smarts. I attended a conference session that she was facilitating a few years ago, that was different than anything I had ever experienced at a library conference. Another library director who had dragged me to the session, just said ‘told you’. Since then I have kept Babs close and so should you.”
B., Public Library Director

“Babs is the quiet voice I carry with me that opens up spaces for my bravery. She validated the idea that leadership doesn’t have to be at the front of the room, and that bravery coupled with compassion is where the magic happens. In every role I embody, I carry the courage that Babs stoked inside of me.”
T., Metro Vancouver Business and Community Leader

“My coaching sessions with Babs are the highlight of my work schedule. They are actually fun, even when I arrive frustrated or feeling overwhelmed with work. I believe she calls it ‘whole person’ coaching, and it really is different and more fruitful from other coaching approaches that I have experienced. If you have an opportunity to grow and learn professionally and personally with Babs, grab it!”
R., Public Library Director

Contact Me

I offer a complimentary 30-minute consultation, via Zoom, to answer your questions and map out some next steps for how we might begin working together.