About Shane

Shane Kinkennon is a former chief strategy officer, former COO, and a long-time consultant, facilitator, and executive coach for leadership teams and boards of directors.

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Expert in humans leading humans.

I’ve spent decades as a consultant to senior-leadership teams and boards of directors, much of that as a strategy developer and planning facilitator. I am a big thinker, world-class leader herder, outstanding steward of “where are we going, and why” conversations, and an all-around standout doer.

I am a certified executive coach and certified master facilitator. I’m also a former Chief Strategy Officer, former COO, and career expert in strategic communications and public affairs. I’ve spent decades as a consultant to senior-leadership teams and boards of directors.

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A respected voice on topics of executive leadership.

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The formal credentials.

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  • Certified Executive Coach, trained and credentialed by the Center for Executive Coaching (CEC), an “Approved Coach Training Provider” (ACTP) of the International Coaching Federation (ICF). 

  • Member of the International Coaching Federation (ICF).

  • Certified Master Facilitator by the Center for Executive Coaching (CEC).

  • Accredited Facilitator: the Five Behaviors, a Wiley-brand training program and credential based on the brilliant and simple team-development framework first represented in Patrick Lencioni’s Five Dysfunctions of a Team.

  • “I’m so grateful to Shane for the work we did together. He helped me unlock a new toolkit of skills, and helped me become a better leader and a better person.”

    — Toufic Boubez, Co-founder and CTO, Catio

  • “Shane has unlocked even more talent and range from one of my firm’s top-performing executive leaders. I could see it almost immediately. What an investment.”

    — Jamie Hampton, Owner and CEO, Mixte Communications

  • “Shane is one of the few people in my work life who is willing to tell me the truth. He pushes me, and that makes him a terrific ally.”

    — Janet Jones, (former) Chief Innovation Officer, General Board of Higher Education & Ministry, United Methodist Church

Sample client wins.

Here’s a sampling of the successes my clients have celebrated after we’ve worked together.

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  • Working with me, a new-CEO client successfully surmounted the limiting conviction that every operational detail required her attention. She loosened her grip on operational levers and focused her energy on the vision, strategy, and the people parts of running her organization.

  • Working with me, a longtime CEO client replaced a long-established habit of holding decision rights closely. He began transferring greater agency and accountability to members of his C-suite, asking more incisive questions, opining less, and pushing decision rights outward. 

  • Working with me, a new-CEO client learned to apply not only on her natural strength of driving strategy but her less-tapped capacity to foster and cultivate. She began seizing opportunities to coach, connect to her fellow executives’ inner motivations, and grow together.

  • Working with me, a highly accomplished CTO found a more collaborative, less combative way to engage his leadership peers. The result was rapid improvements in rapport and collective problem-solving, and his colleagues reported extraordinary progress.

  • Working with me, a CEO client pivoted from months-long analysis paralysis to a pursuit of a self-created plan of action to deal with a charismatic fellow leader who was loved yet failing to deliver.

  • Working with me, a C-suite-team client uncovered the core values that define their business and crafted an integrated plan to render those values embraced and celebrated by the company’s workforce.

  • Working with me, a C-suite team explored, committed to, and set up processes to hold themselves accountable for practicing the “five behaviors of a cohesive team.”