YOU DON’T HAVE TO BECOME SOMEONE ELSE TO LEAD POWERFULLY
It’s about trusting who you already are.
Keynotes
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Interactive Workshops
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Leadership Experiences
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Keynotes • Interactive Workshops • Leadership Experiences •
— KEYNOTES & CONVERSATIONS ACROSS HEALTHCARE —
— THE WORK STARTS WITHIN —Know what you bring. Trust yourself enough to use it.
I help nurses and healthcare professionals recognize what they bring, trust themselves more deeply, and lead from their strengths—especially in a healthcare world that keeps asking them to change.
Healthcare Is Changing.
The People Inside It Matter More Than Ever.
New technology. New expectations. More complexity. More uncertainty.
Healthcare professionals are being asked to adapt constantly—while continuing to care, decide, collaborate, and lead under pressure.
But there's a challenge we don't talk about enough.
Some of the most capable people in healthcare are still questioning whether they have what it takes. They…
Second-guess themselves.
Avoid speaking up in meetings and sharing their ideas.
Compare themselves to louder more traditional leaders.
Overlook strengths that come so naturally they don't recognize them as strengths.
And sometimes, in trying so hard to become the leader they think they're supposed to be, they lose touch with the person they already are.
My work begins with a different question:
What if leading powerfully didn't require becoming someone else?
It begins by recognizing what's already there.
GREAT LEADERSHIP COMES FROM KNOWING WHO YOU ARE AND LEADING FROM THERE
— MEET KAREN —Who you are isn't something to overcome. It's something to lead from.
I help nurses and healthcare professionals recognize what they bring, trust themselves more deeply, and lead from their strengths—especially in a healthcare world that keeps asking them to change.
They help people see themselves differently.
Audiences reflect, laugh, participate, connect the dots—and leave with practical ways to use more of what they already bring.
Because healthcare doesn't need everyone to lead the same way.
“Healthcare needs more people who know what they bring and trust themselves enough to use it.”
MOST REQUESTED TALKS
ROOTED
How to Lead Powerfully From Who You Already Are
The pressure to become a “better leader” can quietly convince capable people that they need to become a different person.
More outspoken. More charismatic. More certain. More like the leader they think they're supposed to be.
But sustainable leadership doesn't begin with imitation.
It begins with knowing what you're rooted in.
In this reflective and practical keynote, Karen invites audiences to explore the strengths, experiences, stories, and values already shaping the way they lead—and identify where comparison and self-doubt may be keeping those qualities hidden.
Rather than offering another formula for the “right” way to lead, ROOTED helps people discover a more powerful starting point:
Themselves.
Participants learn how to:
Recognize the natural strengths they already bring to leadership
Identify where comparison and self-doubt are shaping how they show up
Build self-trust without waiting to feel completely confident
Lead from their own strengths rather than copying someone else's style
Turn personal experience and self-awareness into meaningful contribution
Best for: Nursing conferences • Healthcare leadership events • Women's leadership conferences • Professional associations • Emerging leader programs
LEADERSHIP DOESN'T HAVE A PERSONALITY TYPE
Why Healthcare Needs More Than One Way to Lead
Somewhere along the way, many of us developed an image of what a leader looks like.
Confident. Quick to speak. Charismatic. Certain. Comfortable taking up space.
But what happens to the thoughtful observer? The deep listener? The person who needs a moment to process before speaking? The leader whose influence comes through connection rather than command?
They may not lack leadership ability.
They may simply lead differently.
In this keynote, Karen challenges narrow assumptions about leadership and helps audiences recognize how different strengths and personalities create different—and equally valuable—ways of influencing others.
Participants learn how to:
Recognize leadership strengths they may have overlooked
Separate leadership effectiveness from personality stereotypes
Use their natural style to communicate and influence more effectively
Build presence without becoming louder or more performative
Recognize and develop different expressions of leadership in others
Best for: Nursing conferences • Emerging leader programs • Women's leadership events • Healthcare organizations • Professional associations
FROM STRENGTHS TO SERVICE
Turn What You Naturally Do Best Into Meaningful Contribution
We often spend enormous energy trying to improve what doesn't come naturally while overlooking the talents we use every day.
In this strengths-based experience, Karen helps healthcare professionals recognize the patterns of talent they may be taking for granted—and explore how those strengths can become more intentional sources of contribution, service, and impact.
Participants learn to recognize what they naturally do well, understand how those strengths shape their work and relationships, and apply them more intentionally to the people and communities they serve.
SIGNATURE WORKSHOPS
Build the Leader Within
A LEGO® Serious Play® Experience
Participants make the invisible visible by building and exploring how they see themselves as leaders, what they're rooted in, and how they want to lead next.
From Strengths to Service
A CliftonStrengths® Experience
Move beyond naming strengths to intentionally applying them in leadership, collaboration, and contribution.
The Self-Trust Lab
A Coaching-Based Experience
Explore the patterns behind second-guessing and practice moving from external validation toward clearer, more intentional choices.
What I Bring Into the Room
I know healthcare from the inside.
I bring more than 30 years of nursing and healthcare experience to the stage. I understand the people behind the roles, the pressure behind the work, and the realities behind the statistics.I coach, not just speak.
As an ICF Professional Certified Coach, I know how to ask questions that help people think rather than simply tell them what to think.I start with what's strong.
My strengths-based approach shifts the conversation from fixing people to helping them recognize and intentionally use what they already bring.I make audiences part of the experience.
Reflection, storytelling, dialogue, coaching exercises, CliftonStrengths®, and LEGO® Serious Play® can transform a presentation from something audiences consume into something they participate in.I bring calm authority to the stage.
I don't believe impact requires volume. My style is warm, thoughtful, engaging, and quietly bold—creating space for both reflection and action.
Let's Talk About Your Event
I work with nursing associations, healthcare conferences, hospital leadership teams, and nurse entrepreneur summits.
If you're looking for a speaker who will meet your audience where they are—and help them leave with something real—I'd love to connect.
The Experience Behind My Work
I’m Karen Retardo, RN, MA, PCC, a professional coach, healthcare professional, and speaker who helps nurses and healthcare professionals recognize what they bring, trust themselves more deeply, and lead from who they already are.
With more than three decades in healthcare, I understand what it means to work inside systems built around responsibility, service, expertise, and constant change.
My work brings together professional coaching, CliftonStrengths®, Spiritual Psychology, LEGO® Serious Play® Coaching, storytelling, and experiential learning to help people move beyond self-doubt and recognize the strengths and human potential already within them.
I’ve spoken at nursing, healthcare, and professional conferences on strengths, confidence, identity, leadership, worthiness, and entrepreneurship.
My belief is simple:
You don't have to become someone else to become more powerful. You simply need to see more clearly what has been there all along.
— LET’S CREATE SOMETHING MEANINGFUL—What Could Shift in Your Room?
Maybe your audience doesn't need another person telling them to work harder, speak louder, or become more resilient.
Maybe they need an opportunity to stop.
Reflect.
Recognize what they've been overlooking.
And leave with a deeper trust in what they already bring.