Igniting a more joyful world by inspiring audiences to think and do differently.
Trusted By Leaders At
"Katya is the best I've seen yet!"
I feel at home on a stage.
…especially when the audience gets to co-create energy and learning, and discover their own brilliance. I live for that impact.
Whether it’s a keynote for a global conference, a personalized interactive workshop, or facilitating for a group of executives, I care about cultivating the most authentic and welcoming container.
My goal is to make the audience feel seen, valued, and inspired. A dash of research and a dollop of play, infused with practical application, coalesce into one delicious dish.
I speak about:
- Creating a joyful life and workplace
- Building a resilient, inclusive, and kind work culture
- Implementing habits: bridging the gap between knowing and doing
WHAT AUDIENCES ARE SAYING
Signature Talks and Workshops
FINDING YOUR OWN JOY IN PLAIN SIGHT
Joy matters. It’s linked to greater individual and collective well-being and resilience. In this experiential workshop to build and sustain daily habits of flourishing, participants will leave with three steps they can implement that day to make their lives 10% brighter, and a system of how to maintain those new behaviors.
Perfect for: conferences, team off-sites and gatherings, company events
STARTING (AND KEEPING) PRODUCTIVITY HABITS
Transform habits from common sense (“I know I should do this”) to common practice (“I’m doing it consistently“). Participants will learn the most effective habit systems rooted in behavioral science and apply them to a behavior they’d like to work on, whether at work or in personal pursuits.
Perfect for: workplace teams, personal development
RUNNING POWERFUL MEETINGS AND 1:1s
“Meetings are my favorite part of the day!” said no one ever. Most people simply weren’t taught how to clarify a meeting’s purpose, increase engagement, and have participants leave with actionable takeaways. This workshop shares frameworks and conversation templates for how to make meetings actually fun, and how to run effective 1:1 conversations, too.
Perfect for: team leaders, executives, and managers
DELIVERING UNFORGETTABLE PRESENTATIONS
“Wow, that was the best I’ve heard!” Want your audience to say that about your talk or presentation? This workshop combines both a framework of how to craft a message, and deliver it in a way that people will remember, covering both in-person and online tools and tactics. Highly customizable for your needs and type of presentation.
Perfect for: workplace teams, aspiring public speakers, adult and college-aged audiences
DESIGNING YOUR DREAM LIFE AND CAREER
“I still don’t know what I want to be when I grow up!” A staggering percentage of adults find themselves in unfulfilling jobs…but don’t know how to align with what they really want. This workshop explores not only finding your career path, but also holistic lifestyle design. Participants will leave with tools and frameworks like ikigai, personal reflection templates, questions to build legacy, visualization, and even the use of AI to build the life of their dreams.
Perfect for: workplace teams, adult and college-aged audiences
Got a request? The sky's the limit!
If you’re looking to inspire your audience, and want them to leave with not just a new way of thinking, but a new way of doing and being, you’ve come to the right place.
A few other beloved topics include building a resilient, inclusive, and kind work culture, finding purpose and gratitude, leading change, and how to become a TEDx speaker.
Share with me your wildest vision (topic, audience, desired outcome) and let’s create some magic together.
Approach and Philosophy
Goal:
To make the audience feel seen, valued, and inspired. My talks and workshops are rooted in research and topped with a dollop of playfulness, with an infusion of practical application.
Focus:
To leave the audience with not only something to think about, but something to practice. I bridge the gap between (un)common knowledge and common practice—knowing and doing.
Approach:
Heavily interactive to skyrocket engagement, a sense of connection between audience members, and smiles!
WHAT AUDIENCES ARE SAYING
inspired. invigorated. intrigued.
It's how audiences feel after Katya's talks.
What's the secret?
My main driver is to amplify human flourishing by igniting a more joyful world.
Working with audiences at scale helps spread that impact.
One of my greatest joys is to help individuals and teams in organizations thrive at work.
If we spend so much of our lives working, shouldn’t we find joy, meaning, and purpose in what we do?
My expertise is in facilitating learning experiences for companies like Google, Meta, Netflix, and Dropbox, and speaking at TEDx and a variety of conferences. I’ve had the pleasure of working with:
- 6,000+ managers, executives, and individual contributors, in...
- 600+ workshops, with topics like...
- strategic thinking, influential communication, leading change, feedback, and habits of joy.
Happy clients include:
Read on for other selected talks, workshops, panels, and podcast appearances.
Let's talk about how to WOW your audience.
Because you deserve a speaker who cares.
Selected Talks and Workshops
Spoke at TEDx Huntington Beach at a sold-out venue about the treasure hunt principle: finding wonder and joy in ordinary moments.
Presenting a book talk on Joy in Plain Sight to the Charlottesville community at Barnes & Noble.
Teaching life’s most useful skills to managers and leadership at Ross Stores company offsite.
Presenting three easy habits to build joy at the Massachusetts Conference for Women, the largest women’s conference in the United States.
A behind-the-scenes peek into the author journey, how to build a daily joy habit via the treasure hunt framework, and excellent questions from the audience.
As part of a workshop on personal branding, I speak about the difference between purpose and goals, and the four key things to consider when defining your own purpose.
GoConnect – Authentic Networking
Talks and Workshops
- From Day One – Led dynamic talk on three key lessons when leading change at a people and culture conference. Participant feedback: "This was by far my favorite session in my years attending From Day One!" From Day One explores how companies can build well-grounded values into their business—diversity, responsibility, transparency—and stick with them in an economy driven by disruption. (November 2023)
- Empowered Self Summit – Led a virtual talk titled: Transform Everyday Moments and Unlock Sustainable Joy with the Treasure Hunt Framework as part of a summit to nurture one's mind, energize one's body, and awaken one's soul so they can move through the holiday season with energy, intention, and focus. Featured as one of 15 expert speakers. (October 2023)
- Culture Summit – Led 3-hour interactive workshop on how to help organizations and leaders navigate change. Culture Summit is a cross-functional, cross-industry conference that brings together founders, thought leaders, and culture champions to share actionable culture solutions for companies from startup to scale. (September 2023).
- TEDx Huntington Beach – Selected as a TEDx speaker to present inspirational and actionable speech on how to be a treasure hunter, to find wonder and joy in ordinary moments. (September 2023)
- Building Rapid Trust – Spoke at offsite for Fairfield Residential about how to build rapid trust on a team in the workplace. (June 2023)
- Chief Learning Officer Exchange –Presented the top three tipping-point skills that great managers have for leaders in the learning and development industry. (February 2023)
- Massachusetts Conference for Women – Speaker at the largest women’s’ conference in the United States including Reese Witherspoon, Viola Davis, and Dan Pink. Wrote and presented my Learning Burst to thousands on three small habits to cultivate joy in daily life. Feedback included: “Thank you, this was such an inspiring, uplifting presentation!” and “You are a JOY to work with!” (December 2022)
- READY22: Public Safety Conference – Invited to present at national public safety conference my signature talk on how to build daily habits of flourishing and how to cultivate a sustainable system for lasting behavior-change; one of the most-viewed talks at conference. (November 2022)
- Barnes & Noble Book Signing and Talk – Presented my book Joy in Plain Sight, signed and sold out of books, and gave book talk. Deemed as popular event by B&N staff due to audience size and book talk running over time by 1 hour. (October 2022)
- Book Talk for UVA Clubs: “Finding Your Own Joy in Plain Sight” – Presented talk on the author journey and how to find joy to community of University of Virginia alumni, students, and friends. (June 2022)
- Design & Disruption Virtual Leadership Conference: Navigating Culture via Communication – As a speaker for The Spill Teem, I presented to 65+ individuals across the globe (including Kenya, London, Washington, D.C., and Los Angeles) about the what, how, and why of communication to champion incredible company culture. My keynote included participatory virtual activities, clear takeaways for leaders to implement right away, and “the inspiration [a participant] needed…to help [her] team adapt.” (April 2020)
- You Are Not Your Business Card: Personal Branding Conference Speaker – Presented at Quadruplicity, a premier women's leadership conference, to 300+ individuals about how to cultivate a more human personal brand, and how to connect with others in a more authentic manner. (February 2019)
- Color Your Personal Brand Workshop - Developed and led a full-day workshop for Washington, D.C. community on how to cultivate a personal brand. We lead 65+ participants through experiential learning on understanding oneself through internal reflection and external feedback. (February 2019)
- Innovate with Empathy - Identifying personal bias and using empathy to seek to understand and be understood. (Center for Nonprofit Excellence, December 2018)
- GoConnect: "Listening with _____ in Mind" – Understanding how to authentically connect with another and actively listen. (Common House, November 2018)
- How to Prepare for Competitive College Admissions – Weekly local and regional presentations. (April 2017 - May 2019)
- Anger Management Techniques: Controlling Your Anger – Psychosocial rehabilitation educational workshop for consumers with schizophrenia and substance use/abuse disorders. (Dual Recovery Center, Charlottesville, VA, March 2015)
- Envisioning an Ideal Community – Invited to present workshop on community-building after school shooting for student leaders of Chardon High School. (Chardon, OH, June 2014)
Panels
- Psychological Society at UVA Alumni Panels - Spoke to current students and alumni about careers in psychology and how to make the most out of an undergraduate degree. (March 2022 and May 2015)
- Women's Entrepreneurship Week's Local Panel of Women Entrepreneurs - Sponsored by Young Leaders of the Americas Initiative Professional Fellows and the Society of Women Engineers, I spoke to current engineering students about vulnerability and empathy in the workplace, and what it means to be a female inventor. (October 2018)
- Society for Cognitive Science Alumni Panel - Spoke to current students and alumni about careers in cognitive science and how to make the most out of an undergraduate degree. (March 2018)
- Panel for Current and Prospective Students - Created an initiative to connect current high school and college students by hosting and moderating two conversational panels in different cities to demystify the college process. (August and October 2018)
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- Toastmasters Speech Contest: 1st Place
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- Color Your Personal Brand All-Day Workshop
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- Teaching design thinking skills
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- Women’s Entrepreneurship Panel
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- Curated and led panel on college admissions
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- Leading a workshop on building purpose
Selected Podcasts and Speeches
An intimate discussion of the treasure hunt framework, productivity vs. rest, the power of silence.
A hybrid speech / podcast / interview on finding our own joys in plain sight.
As part of a Toastmasters exhibition, I speak about rain, resistance, and freedom.