Kelly Mackin Speaking Topics

• The 5 Leadership Lies Holding You Back

  Everything you've been told about leadership is, at least a little bit, wrong. The advice we've accepted as "best practice" is often the very thing preventing leaders from succeeding, and Kelly Mackin is here to help you retire it. Built on years of quantitative research and more than a decade working with global teams, she challenges five of the biggest leadership beliefs we rarely question and replaces them with a clear science-backed roadmap so you can lead happy, healthy, high-performing teams while taking your leadership to the next level.

  You'll discover why "one-size-fits-none" is one of the biggest mistakes leaders make, and what it really means to lead with a human-first approach to meet people’s unique motives. You'll uncover the real reason people lose motivation, underperform, and ultimately walk out the door. Want to build trust? It has far less to do with honesty or transparency than most people think. Frustrated by your team’s performance? You’re not holding them accountable in the right way and infusing it with the right dose of compassion. And those one-on-ones you think are making a difference? They probably aren't. You’ll learn a new approach that works.

  You'll walk away with a modern leadership playbook, having the clarity and confidence to fix what's broken, transform your leadership, and create a thriving workplace.

  Audience Takeaways:

  • A foundational human-centric framework built on the truth that thriving is personal, not universal, with a pathway for meeting the human needs that matter most to each person at work.
  • The real formula for trust that moves the needle and a new approach to accountability that pairs high expectations with compassion, in the right way.
  • Tangible leadership strategies that support both well-being and performance for greater collective success.

• What Drives Your People

  The Leadership Advantage of Human Motives

  Leaders today face growing pressure to retain top talent and create cultures where people can be well and perform well at work.

  Yet many leaders still lack one critical insight: what truly drives the people they lead.

  Kelly Mackin will share the science behind the 28 human motives that drive people to stay, grow, and thrive. When these motives are met, like purpose, free expression, belonging, work-life harmony, fun, and self-esteem, engagement and well-being rise, retention skyrockets, and stress and burnout go down.

  Yet thriving isn’t universal, it’s personal. All motives matter, but they don’t matter equally.

  You will learn to lead with motives in mind AND leave one-size-fits-none leadership behind, embracing motive diversity and taking a human-first approach to coach each person uniquely with clarity and confidence.

  But we have to talk about motives to meet them, and they are often a missing conversation. Kelly will show you how to bring motives into the everyday, including how to lead “stay interviews” or meaningful motive one-on-ones that surface what’s often left unsaid, because that silence costs us.

  You’ll leave this session with a powerful new mindset and actionable insights to apply motives across four levels: your own needs, your team’s alignment, the culture you co-create, and how you lead.

  Audience Takeaways:

  • A foundational framework for building thriving cultures and understanding how unmet motives are often the root of stress and burnout
  • A clear path beyond one-size-fits-none leadership for a human-first, more effective way of leading
  • A practical roadmap to evaluate, communicate, and meet motives with intention and impact for greater success

• Motives Matter

  The Science of Leading Happy, Healthy, High-Performing Teams

  It’s time to move beyond recycled advice and outdated approaches to creating happy, healthy, high-performing teams.

  Kelly Mackin cuts through the noise with a transformative framework grounded in her research on the 28 motives that drive us to thrive. These human needs like purpose, free expression, growth, belonging, flexibility, self-esteem, and fun, are our greatest motivators, they drive our well-being and performance.

  Kelly will show you how to apply these insights across four levels of impact: starting with your own needs, building alignment and greater team connection, co-creating a culture where motives are strong, and leading with motives in mind, while leaving “one-size-fits-none” leadership behind.

  Because thriving isn’t universal, it’s personal. All motives matter, but they don’t matter equally. We need a human-first, personalized approach grounded in what matters most to each person, with the ability to actually talk about it. You’ll learn the art of meaningful motive one-on-ones or “stay interviews” that build trust and drive long-term loyalty.

  Leaving this session, you’ll be empowered to put insights into action to elevate both people and performance.

  Audience Takeaways:

  • How to have the clarity and confidence to be a trusted motives-driven leader who leaves stress and burnout behind and makes a more meaningful impact.
  • A foundational framework for building thriving workplaces
  • A practical pathway to evaluate, communicate, and meet motives with intention and impact for greater success

• Work-Life Harmony

  Crafted By You, Not Given to You

  Tired of vague advice and buzzwords around “balancing work and life” that leave you wondering how to actually make it happen for yourself and the people you lead? Yeah, Kelly Mackin was too. That’s why she went all in on quantitative research to cut through the fluff and uncover the six proven pillars of Work-Life Harmony.

  Kelly brings each pillar to life with real-world strategies leaders can use right away, whether it’s the 15% White Space Rule to prevent overload, creating a communication agreement that honors different work-life styles, setting boundaries that stick, or shifting the mindsets that quietly sabotage harmony. You’ll walk away with fresh insights, work-life conflict tips, and actions that strengthen well-being and combat stress and burnout.

  Kelly will also show you how to facilitate a Work-Life Synergy Session with your team, complete with research-driven prompts and exercises, so you can co-create a culture of harmony built on real input and shared ownership for lasting success.

  Work-Life Harmony is CRAFTED by you; it is not given to you. In a world where only 16% of employees are thriving at work, the insights from this keynote will help you move from a culture of ill-being to thriving.

  Audience Takeaways:

  • A Work-Life Harmony Playbook full of actionable strategies for each of the six harmony pillars.
  • A strategy to disarm hidden cultural beliefs that sabotage harmony and replace them with conscious commitments.
  • A customizable roadmap for areas like inclusive communication norms, optimizing purposeful meeting management, and balancing workloads.

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