Naomi Bagdonas

Naomi Bagdonas is a Lecturer at Stanford Graduate School of Business and an Executive Coach. As a strategist and experience designer, Naomi unlocks creativity, innovation, and levity in leadership teams. She facilitates intentional, interactive sessions for the boards and executive teams of Fortune 100 companies to help them dissolve barriers to progress, spur alignment, and create lasting impact. As a strategic advisor versed in humor, behavioral science, and human perceptions, Naomi coaches executives and celebrities in discovering and telling their authentic stories. This includes preparing clients for organization-wide events, political campaign speeches, and talks delivered at international forums such as the UN, as well as appearances including on The Today Show, Saturday Night Live, The Ellen DeGeneres Show, and Late Night with Jimmy Fallon. Naomi co-created Business Chemistry, a personality system that enables leaders to collaborate seamlessly across different working styles, which over five hundred thousand people all over the world have used to build powerful relationships in their businesses and lives. Naomi co-created and teaches popular courses at Stanford’s Graduate School of Business, including "Humor: Serious Business" about the power of humor in our lives, "Rethinking Purpose" about how to achieve moonshot goals while building a life rooted in purpose, and "A New Type of Leader" about designing organizations where happiness and well-being can thrive. She lectures at Harvard Business School and gives talks to organizations and conferences around the world. When she isn’t teaching and training others, Naomi spends time onstage at a local comedy theater, backpacks in the Sierras, and coaches San Francisco County Jail inmates to use improv comedy skills for agility and resilience (plus to laugh together, generously).