Barbara Waxman MS, MPA, PCC

COACH, LIFE STAGE EXPERT, GERONTOLOGIST,
SPEAKER, AUTHOR, ANGEL INVESTOR

Barbara Waxman, founder of Odyssey Group Coaching, is passionate about building leaders’ personal and professional skills so they can thrive while increasing their ability to manage complexity and maximize their effectiveness. With more than two decades of experience coaching CEOs, C-suite leaders, and entrepreneurs, Barbara utilizes a holistic approach to help clients lead and communicate authentically, sustain high performance and expand their influence and impact.

Barbara is a highly sought-after coach, workshop leader, and keynote speaker who works with leaders from across the country and abroad. She is part expert coach, caring truth-teller, strategic thought partner, and accountability advocate, and buoys her approach with compassion, honesty, research-based expertise, and a light heart. Her experience as a Gerontologist and coach has culminated in the proprietary transformative coaching model, Entrepreneurship Turned Inward©, and her science-based Five Essential Elements© process. Barbara has worked in the automotive, financial services, health care, nonprofit, and technology sectors, among others.

Barbara serves as an Advisory Council Member for the Stanford Center on Longevity, an Advisory Board Member for Stanford Lifestyle Medicine, a faculty member at Chip Conley’s Modern Elder Academy, and an angel investor in the Active Aging and Longevity Fund with Portfolia. She has appeared on CBS This Morning, and has been featured in Marin Magazine, Arianna Huffington’s Thrive Global, Next Avenue, and is a frequent podcast guest. Barbara recently authored How to Avoid Burnout, Provide Exceptional Care, and Enhance Work-Life Integration, a chapter in the upcoming book The Successful Health Care Professional’s Guide: Everything You Need to Know But Weren’t Taught in Training (Springer Publishing). Barbara is also the author of two books examining aging including, The Middlescence Manifesto: Igniting the Passion of Midlife. Barbara holds master’s degrees in Public Administration and Gerontology from the University of Southern California and is a graduate of Colgate University. She earned her coaching certifications from the International Coach Federation and The Hudson Institute. Originally from New York, she lives in the San Francisco Bay Area with her husband, Scott, and is thankful to have her adult children not too far away.
ICF Member Leadership Coach Barbara Waxman
Hudson Coaching Institute Certified Coach Barbara Waxman
Linkage Global Institute Leadership Development Barbara Waxman
Resilient Leader Coach Barbara Waxman
Leadership Coach Barbara Waxman

Book Barbara

Connect with Barbara’s team to inquire about your next event, workshop, or other opportunity.
For immediate needs, please email.

Inspiring audiences with passion, intelligence, and humor towards clarity, commitment and action.

“I loved Barbara’s presence at the event: powerfully soft and approachable, grounded and warm, wise and on her 'edge.' She was generous, beautiful, and excitingly real and alive!”

Keynotes & Topics

The Future of Resilient Leadership

Lead From Your Chair with Resilience, Equanimity and Impact

Navigating today’s complex challenges and the demands of personal and professional leadership can feel depleting and isolating. Leadership—the art of motivation and of accomplishing goals-is never easy. Its demands are steep and have caused a secondary epidemic of stress, isolation and burnout. Amplify your leadership and become your own CEO—Chief Energy Officer—by utilizing an approach that rests upon three pillars: energy management, mindset and work-life integration. Contrary to popular belief, your most valuable currency is not your money or time. In this highly engaging presentation, leadership coach and gerontologist Barbara Waxman offers a toolset to help launch you make the change you want to see in your home, community, companies and more.
  • Activate your focus, resilience, energy and impact by learning an approach based on cutting edge research from the fields of leadership, longevity and optimal performance.
  • Learn the proven, foundational “energy building blocks,” the essential pieces that ancient traditions and modern research agree bolster personal resilience, energy, and equanimity.
  • Understand how perception can impact reality and why growth versus a fixed mindset is just the beginning.
  • Replace the goal of work-life balance with a more realistic yardstick: work-life integration.

Middlescence

New Age. New Stage. Aging and Longevity in the 21st Century

Gerontologist and life stage expert, Barbara Waxman, shares valuable insights that will turn everything you think about the future of aging and longevity in the 21st century on its head. During this dynamic presentation, Barbara distills decades of research to help you develop insights into how the aging of America and demographics of the 21st century have revealed the life stage Middlescence, creating a tremendous opportunity for communities, companies, investors and policy makers.

  • Understand Middlescence, the game-changing life stage created by the longevity patterns of the 21st Century and learn it’s application in your field of interest.
  • Debunk the midlife crisis myth and embrace the Middlescent Mindset rooted in long-life learning and growth to transform the way you live, love, and lead.
  • Lean into the challenges and embrace the opportunities of the burgeoning multigenerational wisdom economy transforming communities, companies, and leadership.
  • Understand how to extend your healthspan and sense of purpose.

Testimonials for Barbara

Jeff Hamaoui, Chief Innovation and Community Design, Modern Elder Academy

"Barb is singular as a teacher.  She is an outstanding colleague and a phenomenal teacher. Barb has a unique adaptive teaching style. Barb is meticulous, organized, specific and precise but she is also extremely intuitive and able to flex toward the needs of the people in front of her. This makes working with Barb a powerful balance between structure and flow that few are able to match. Barb is deeply qualified and studied in her field. This depth of knowledge and practice is what allows her to shift so easily between the plan and the needs she sees. Be prepared, be professional, and be ready to go all the way with her because she is not f**king around. Best of all, be assured that she will get amazing results."

Leslie Bartlett MEA Testimonial for Barbara Waxman

"Barbara facilitated one of the most impactful exercises I've ever been through. I left the workshop with the confidence I needed to leave my unfulfilling corporate job and pursue I life I now live and love everyday. Barbara is a highly skilled coach and facilitator with a deep understanding of what it takes to help people move through and towards what they want. She cares about the people she works with. She uses progressive tools to identify where we are what we need and want, and provides a map to see things more clearly so that decisions become easier."

Magnus Baarman Coaching Testimonial for Barbara Waxman

"Before working with Barbara I did not understand the potential of coaching. Barbara has the ability to capture the essence of a complex situation and build a productive conversation around it. She understands the details and the players in my environment so we can dive into breaking things down in workable ways, she asks the right questions so I can determine the best answers. That is how you learn."

Alexandra Morgan Coaching Testimonial Barbara Waxman

"Once I started working with Barbara, I identified ways in which I was working against myself work-wise, health-wise and even psychologically...[The] level of true support and concern for my well-being made it possible for me to be more creative in problem-solving across my entire life."

Chip Conley Testimonial for Barbara Waxman

"Barbara Waxman's empathetic and practical approach to inspiring people to embrace midlife is a marvel to watch."

Julie Castro Abrams Coaching Testimonial for Barbara Waxman

"Barbara has a terrific tool box and is very results driven, thoughtful and organized. She helps me see different ways of viewing a situation which are transformational."

Carolyn Graham Coaching Testimonial Barbara Waxman

"Barbara was a strong asset as I prepared to step into an executive role. She helped me articulate what was holding me back; create a plan to effectively transition my peer relationships into direct reports; then confidently step into the expanded external requirements of my new role."

Coaching Testimonial Barbara Waxman Betsy McCluskey

"As a coach myself, I have engaged coaches at various times in my life. What engaged me about Barbara was her perspective on breaking myths about aging and an understanding of the personal changes this life phase brings. Oh, of course! Barbara brings research and insights into aging and empowers people to be proactive in creating their future."

Laura Talmus | Barbara Waxman Coaching Testimonial

Barbara blends together wisdom, leadership, coaching and business acumen to help you achieve your own goals. Whether it's a career transition, a challenge in your current role, a desire to create a long-term plan, or to have a Team Leadership Coach to help your team, Barbara does it all with grace, humor and incredible support.

Jaye Chen Coaching Testimonial for Barbara Waxman

"So many breakthroughs, impossible to count. Many of the things that I thought I cared about were utterly insignificant compared to what really mattered to me. She helped me attain clarity of purpose, both for "now" and for the longer-term; I was able to re-center myself on what I truly valued in all facets of my life and rechannel the courage that I deployed on behalf of everyone around me to courage in myself. "

Ruben Aquilevich Coaching Testimonial for Barbara Waxman

"Barbara is compassionate, empathetic and challenges you to create the change you want to see so as to grow in all facets of life."

"Barbara’s energy is positive and comes from practicing what she preached. Before working together my leadership felt scattered with lack of appropriate focus at time. With Barbara’s insights I have been more self-aware of my strengths and challenges and have been about to strengthen my overall leadership as a result."

The Future of Resilient Leadership

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