Kathleen G. Strickland
Founder and Chairman

Gina Barnett
Senior Vice President

Bill Young
Executive Vice President

Robert P. Harwood
Senior Vice President

The Strickland Group was founded in 1989 on Kathy Strickland's belief that increased personal awareness can dramatically expand both leadership potential and executive effectiveness. The firm initially offered customized services to senior executives in the areas of executive coaching, traditional career management, outplacement, and job-transition consulting, but soon grew to offer more extensive executive coaching and integrated communications training.

Today, as both consultant and coach, Kathy's unique talent is assisting executives to "relax into their competence" by increasing their awareness of how they are perceived by others -- and then helping to translate this knowledge into effective behavior in terms of leadership, management, and communication. This innovative perspective has helped propel Kathy specifically, and The Strickland Group in general, to global recognition in executive coaching.

In addition to her leadership of The Strickland Group, Kathy maintains a full practice in executive coaching. She is dedicated to carefully matching corporate and individual aspirations, the better to maximize senior-management effectiveness. To both leaders and teams, she brings a particular understanding of the importance of "executive relationships" in surmounting leadership challenges.

It is Kathy Strickland's belief that executive coaching is a significant stand-alone service and also a crucial element in success in outplacement. Her conviction is that that lasting change starts at the top level.

In recent years, Kathy's experiences in coaching global corporations and their executives has expanded her ability to contribute substantially to the well-being of global and multinational companies. Because of this expanding world perspective, Kathy has served on the Board of Directors of the Association of Career Management Firms International, and is a founding member and board member of Global Coaching Partners, with membership in the United Kingdom, France, Switzerland, Germany, Belgium, Scandinavia, Hong Kong, South Africa, Australia, and New Zealand.

Kathy also maintains an ownership position in, and serves on the Board of Directors of, The Change Partnership/South Africa. She also currently sits (or in the recent past has served) on the Board of Directors of a career development firm, a private school, a country club, and a charitable foundation. She has two grown children and one grandchild; is an avid golfer, sculptor, and cook; and is currently writing a book.
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Bill Young is an international voice, speech, presentation and drama coach with more that 25 years of experience. He brings to business communication the vision of a theatrical director.

He works with senior executives and organization leaders to increase their unique interpersonal and public speaking styles, while advancing the organization's competitive edge. Specific areas of focus include individual and group presentations; attention to the influence of personality and cultural factors in one's communication style; presentation model building; content development and logic; answering questions from challenging audiences or media.

Bill believes in the satisfaction, creative pleasure and self esteem people feel when they can speak with confidence. He instills the idea that enthusiasm, brevity and knowledge of one's audience assures effective, aesthetically pleasing, delivery of the message. Having taught university level classes in singing, speech anatomy, phonetics and courses related to speech pathology, he is well versed in all aspects of technical production and content presentation. His many years as a strategic communication analyst and theatre coach have given him a large repertoire of methods and approaches from which to draw.

He has created numerous products and services for The Strickland Group. As Director of Executive Communication Services, he ensures that clients take away skills in an environment that's technically up-to-date, time-efficient, and infused with the reality of today's global business needs.

He has designed individual and team services for major financial institutions, insurance and pharmaceutical companies, Wall Street firms, multi-media, technology and basic industry companies. He has directed IPO "road shows," created new product rollouts and coordinated international banking teams. Bill has personally delivered services across the US and in the Far East.

Bill holds a B.A. in voice and music composition from California State University Fresno and a M.A. in music composition and theory from San Francisco State University. He is married, enjoys poetry and geology, plays piano and sings jazz music.
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“It is my belief that the oak tree lives inside the acorn, that full integration of one’s potential, aspirations and talents already exists. Dissimilar from the acorn, which requires the right outside conditions for the oak to bloom, we contain those conditions within our creative selves.”

Gina brings a unique background to The Strickland Group, one which fits our communication coaching practice perfectly. She has specialized in communication coaching, team building and professional self-evaluation programs, working for such corporate and educational clients as: GE Capital, NYU Medical College and the NY City Public School system.

Gina’s philosophy and her way of working with clients results in powerful, quick and lasting change. She shows people how to exude executive presence and assists them in achieving their communication goals. She believes that effective communication begins with the ability to consciously connect, initially with one’s own habitual gestures, vocal patterns and body language – and ultimately their underlying meanings. She knows that the acquisition of interpersonal communication skills is not a mystery, but a craft, one that can be learned through feedback, experience and practice.

Gina comes to The Strickland Group after working for over 25 years in the professional theater as an actress, playwright, director and coach.  Having taught at the university and post-graduate professional level she brings a diverse range of experience to her communication coaching. As a professional actress she draws from diverse, highly successful training methodologies and techniques and is well versed in many aspects of physical and vocal presentation. As a professional playwright and director she brings decades of experience coaching others on how to embody whatever role they are playing in a joyful and physically integrated manner. She brings to The Strickland Group an extraordinarily wide range of tools to enhance each candidate’s leadership potential.

Gina’s plays have won awards, been published and been produced in New York and regionally. She’s written for long-running TV shows in the USA and cutting edge shows in Europe. Concomitant with teaching at such institutions NYU, Sarah Lawrence College MSU, and The Ensemble Studio Theater, she ran her own professional acting studio in NY for over 20 years. She lives in Manhattan with her husband and son.
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“Corporations can be symphonic or cacophonous.  Corporate harmony resonates from a single theme.  Identifying that theme and building a brand around it is the sum and substance of the corporate communications function.  If the theme is expressive, employees will rally to it.  Customers, investors, reporters and government officials, all the publics that the corporation values, will soon follow.”

Bob Harwood is a seasoned communications practitioner and coach.  He brings to his work the curiosity of a reporter, the business focus of a financial analyst, the organizational insight of a senior executive, the enthusiasm of a student, and the empathy of a coworker. 

His career has been building corporate departments and initiating aggressive and focused communications programs for employers and clients.  He believes a successful corporate communications effort starts by identifying the core value, the essence, of the organization.  This takes enormous discipline and soul-searching, but it may be the easier part.  Building a consensus of management and employees around a common vision is where it gets tough.  But when they have rallied around the core value, branding and reputation building begin in earnest.

Bob’s approach to communications is to work with everyone in the organization to tell the corporate story.  Internal communications works through the grapevine, the intranet, the company newspaper, and the chairman’s memo.  Press relations works through the pitch letter and press release, the chance meeting and the press conference.  Customer communications depends on the internet, the phone call and the handshake.  Investor communications requires government filings but succeeds by establishing personal relationships. 

Bob began his professional career as a broadcast reporter and later covered a number of basic industries for The Wall Street Journal.  He has been the head of corporate and investor communications for major corporations in aerospace and defense, outsourcing and personnel, and chemical industries.  He has also worked for a variety of businesses in banking and finance, electronics and computers, and automotive and industrial manufacturing. 
 
His lifework is to help organizations get the maximum value from their communications assets and in turn enhance the reputation of the company and its management with all their constituencies.
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