Kim Zilliox

Want a satisfied audience? Hire Kim. She brings the perfect amount of humor and engagement paired with knowledge and expertise, to create interesting and memorable keynotes, breakouts, and workshops. Kim has 20 years of leadership development and management experience and is a leading Executive Coach and Leadership Speaker.

Kim brings with her a wealth of knowledge around leadership effectiveness, talent development, team building, change management, employee engagement, culture creation, and goal achievement. Kim specializes in coaching and educating current and future leaders to be successful in leading organizations and teams to achieve the highest results possible in today's challenging transitional business environment.

Kim's current and past clients include NEW, ConAgra, Smucker's, Safeway and Nestlé, as well as Google, eBay, Cisco, Intel, Apple, Oracle and HP to name just a few. She has spoken at various organizations across the country including Cisco, Intel, Oracle, and at numerous conferences annually including Giant Landover, HDMA, Acosta, Pepperidge Farm, NEW, and many others.  She creates and leads webinars for senior and emerging leaders on an ongoing basis through partner organizations and previously for NEW Leadership Academy. She manages a year-long leadership development program for women senior leaders where she coaches, facilitates, and engages with corporate partners to ensure learning objectives match needs.

Kim earned an M.B.A. from UC Irvine, an M.A. in Counselling from Santa Clara University, and a B.A. in Psychology from UC Santa Barbara. She is a Certified Coach, is qualified in the MBTI and Strong Interest Inventory; is certified in the Lominger 360; HBDI, Hogan, and an expert in the DiSC instrument and StrengthsFinder. Kim has been an advisor to the California Career Development Association, and her association affiliations include SBODN, ASTD, BAAPT, and the National Speakers Association.

Here is a list of Kim's most commonly asked for speaking topics. Each can be delivered in 1-2 hours and to all company audiences (where applicable), or, to focused leader participants.

 1. Emotional Intelligence: The #1 Key to Career Success

Emotional Intelligence (EQ) is a foundation for career and life success. More than we are often aware, our emotions impact our thoughts and behaviors. When not managed well, our thoughts and emotions can take over and cause us to damage relationships, disrupt communication, and cause unnecessary inefficiencies. In this interactive session, we discuss what EQ is, participants practice strategies to increase their skills, and additional suggestions are provided for continuous development after the session. Participants will walk away with a basic understanding of the topic, enhanced skills, and solid, applicable action items for increasing their skills around this critical career skillset. Ideally, a suggested book and assessment are provided to each participant, but this is not necessary.

 2.     Understanding Personality Differences at Work

"Why can't they just do things like I do? It would be so much easier!" Have you found yourself frustrated when working with individuals who do things differently than you do? Do you need to work with people who clearly have different working and communication styles? Having a richer understanding of basic personalities and preferences can provide answers and access to more effective and enjoyable working relationships. Participants will explore their own personality preferences and learn how to identify those of others to enhance communication and teamwork in the workplace (and beyond). Free or fee assessments and reports are an available option for this class.

 3.     Personality Types Under Stress

The pre-requisite to this class is Understanding Personality Differences at Work. Building on the learning from the previous session, participants in this training will uncover how their own personality type is affected during high-stress situations. They will learn the behavior and signs of increased stress as well as what to do to reduce their own stress. They will also explore how other personality types are impacted during stressful situations. This course is ideal for individuals, teams, or organizations who are experiencing a high level of stress and are looking for support around how to manage stress more effectively and how to support those around them to do so as well.

 4. Effective Communication: Speaking and Listening

The flow of information in business is critical to an organizations' success. Studies commonly show the significant financial cost of ineffective communication. It seems like it should be so simple, but it is one of the most complicated topics there is. How do we deliver information that is optimally received by the other party? How do we listen to another's entire communication, even if we disagree? Learn how you can ensure efficient and effective communication between you and those around you in this interactive and practical session. Participants will leave with a solid understanding of how to improve their own communication, and, inspire enhanced communication around them.

 5.     Generational Differences

How do the 5 generations in the workplace differ? How are they similar? Most importantly, what can they learn about each other to leverage their unique strengths and maximize contribution. Learn the basic commonalities of each generation and how to use this information to drive results.

 6.     Embracing Diversity

Never has this topic been more critical than in today's incredibly diverse working environment. While eradicating biases about others will take more time than this session allows for, participants will do deep work to look at their own opinions, views, and overt or covert attitudes towards those they perceive to be different in the workplace around them. As we all move towards unity, acceptance, respect, and celebration, this session will help us on our path to understanding and embracing all elements of diversity to create true synergy in the company and beyond.

 7. Giving and Receiving Feedback Effectively

Organizations that create a culture of feedback far surpass those who don't. Providing effective feedback, whether positive or constructive is an art as well as a skill. The purpose is to ensure the feedback is heard and applied to create better performance. If given ineffectively, the message is muddied, or, worse, the receiver becomes defensive and stops listening. On the flip side, it can sometimes be difficult to receive feedback, either positive or constructive. With this topic, we discuss and learn both how to give feedback well, as well as how to receive it gracefully.

 8.     Employee Engagement: How to Ensure Employees are Happy and Productive

Learn the essentials of full Employee Engagement. Understand the specific elements that create engagement and how to increase your own on a consistent basis. This workshop includes identifying strengths, interests, values, and contribution to the organization. *(If presented to leaders, this topic includes information on how to coach employees to maximize their engagement).

 9.     Successfully Leveraging Change in an Ever-Changing World

Change is a constant part of our culture, especially this year, yet we still don't manage it well all the time, nor do we always capitalize on and leverage new opportunities. Change often brings uncertainty, more questions than answers, and various responses from various individuals. Learn the stages we all experience during the change process, how to navigate successfully through change yourself, and if you lead others, how to help them do the same.

 10.  Conflict Management: How to Find Common Ground

What do you do when you don't see eye to eye with someone? Some shy away from addressing it, while others are too direct. Learn how to find a happy medium and effectively manage conflict. This session will teach participants how to stop burning bridges and start building them. Participants will walk away with proven and tangible strategies to work through conflict situations and find meaningful resolution.

 11.  Key Leadership Skills

All too often, leaders are promoted into leadership with little or no training. Perhaps there is an urgent need and they are asked to jump in, or other times, organizations are moving so fast and furiously that there is no time for training. Regardless, many leaders find themselves reacting and responding to situations that they have no answers for. With this topic, we discuss the basic competencies of leadership. While the list of competencies is long, this session focuses on the top 5-8 leadership skills depending on time. The top skills are agreed upon with the client prior to content delivery, based on organizational needs and values.

 12.  Leadership Presence:  How to Be Seen and Heard Powerfully

How do strong leaders present themselves in a way that they are listened to with respect? What is that 'it' factor that they seem to naturally exude, yet somehow, we know they must have worked on some of it. In this session, learn the key ingredients of strong leadership, and practical tips, tools, and exercises for enhancing your leadership presence. Public speaking skills are addressed in this session.

 13.  Transitioning from Peer to Leader: The Critical Transformation

Can being a star performer hold you back from being a great leader? What do you do about friends who were your peers now that you are a leader? What about peers who were also vying for the leadership position? Discover the critical perspectives to consider in your new role, which behaviors to give up, and new skills to add to your tool kit, to successfully make the transition.

 14. Influence: How to Cause a Desired Effect at Any Level

In today's matrix business environments, it is critical to learn the art of influence across all levels, functions, departments, and sometimes industries, regardless of title. Gone are the days of dictatorial management and top-down reporting structures as a norm. Individuals who can master this competency drive results and therefore are highly sought after. Learn how to develop and hone this skill for yourself.

 15.  Delegation: How to Empower Yourself and Others

Letting go of something one knows how to do efficiently and effectively is often challenging for leaders. It takes time to train someone else on what and how to do a new task and to do it well. Leaders often fall into the trap of putting off this training and just doing a task themselves, or, jumping back in after delegating a task, only to disempower an employee and delay the process further. Unfortunately, what results is an inefficient use of a leader's time and disengagement of their report. This workshop discusses how to delegate well, how to empower employees, and how to look up and out for broader scope opportunities.

 16.  Branding: How are You Being Perceived by Others?

What is my brand? How am I known in the organization? How do I want to be known? It is important to know the answers to these and other questions regarding how one is showing up in the organization. This topic helps individuals answer these questions and identify their authentic brand. They then learn a systematic process to communicate their brand to others in the right way to be proactive about their career and how they are perceived.

 17.  Accountability: Holding Others Accountable Effectively

Ultimately, there is a right way, and a wrong way, to hold others accountable. When done well, others do what they say they will do when they said they will do it, and workflows more efficiently and effectively. When not done well, deadlines are missed, costs are incurred, and frustrations peak. This session discusses the optimal way to create a structure of accountability so that individuals, leaders, and organizations can work together the most seamlessly. Company-wide systems are discussed and applied if helpful and productive.

 18.  Being Strategic: Difficult for Some, Needed for Leaders

For some, being strategic is natural. For these people, they can't help but look to the future, devise a plan, and act on it. For the rest of the population, this does not come as naturally, but, it can be learned, or, learned enough. For leaders, thinking about, declaring, and communicating a strategy is an important aspect of the job, especially as responsibilities increase. This topic discusses how to develop skills and strategies to become more strategic.