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Bill Eckstrom

President & Founder, EcSell Institute; International Keynote Speaker; Author, "The Coaching Effect"

Bill Eckstrom's primary passion is growth - especially how coaches and leaders impact the growth and performance of individuals and teams. This passion inspired Bill to launch EcSell Institute, a research-based organization that works with leaders internationally to help them better understand, measure, and elevate coaching’s impact on performance.

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Bio

Bill Eckstrom is the CEO and founder of EcSell Institute. Bill’s robust professional career path has encompassed sales, sales leadership, executive leadership with both private and publicly traded companies, and as a founder of start-ups. In 2008, he established EcSell Institute to fill a void he witnessed and personally experienced in the coaching and leadership profession within businesses. Since then, EcSell’s research and improvement programming has been utilized in the athletic and academic worlds, spawning his new start-ups EcSell Sports and EcSell Education in 2019.

In 2017, Bill was invited to the TEDx stage where he shared his research and experiences in a record-setting talk titled Why Comfort Will Ruin Your Life. A live audience of over 1,700 people, and 4 million more online, have since watched this talk and have insight into his now famous words: “…what makes you comfortable can ruin you, and what makes you uncomfortable is the only way to grow.”

Bill co-authored the book The Coaching Effect: What great leaders do to increase sales, enhance performance, and sustain growth which was introduced in April 2019, and has been a best-seller since the first week of its release.

As a result of his broad experiences in the realms of business and athletics, along with his company’s findings, Bill’s work as a keynote speaker is highly regarded throughout the world. While his audiences call him “profoundly authentic,” “highly entertaining,” and more, Bill is most proud of the fact his material is based on EcSell’s science and research—he does not present motivational fluff. He has presented to hundreds of groups throughout the world ranging in size from 25-5,000 on a myriad of poignant topics.

Lincoln, Nebraska is home for Bill and his wife. Together they have three children, Will Jr, Claire, and Maddie. Philanthropically, Bill prefers a very hands-on approach as evidenced by his current involvement and passion-- therapy dog work. He and his four-legged companion, Aspen, visit children in hospitals, senior citizens in nursing homes, students in academic settings, and offer emotional support to various athletic teams. Bill also has a strong need to be in the outdoors and finds time each year to spend in field and stream with his children and close friends.

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Keynotes

Featured Keynote

The Growth Rings: Becoming Comfortable With Discomfort

After documenting and researching over 100,000 coaching interactions in the workplace, Bill Eckstrom shares life-altering, personal and professional development ideas through the introduction of the Growth Rings. Bill’s viral TEDx Talk, “Why Comfort Will Ruin Your Life,” first introduced the Growth Rings model and the impact they have on the evolution or decay of everything in our world. The Growth Rings illustrate how dangerous it can be to remain in a state of comfort, and how being in a state of discomfort is the only way to sustain growth.
In this presentation, Bill shares his wildly popular, research-based discovery and its applications to your everyday life. Examples and lessons used are taken from business, athletics, nature, psychology and physiology. There are no boundaries to the applications of the Growth Rings as evidenced by the feedback from Bill’s followers around the world.

Leadershift: Exposing Coaching Effectiveness

Leadershift: Exposing Coaching Effectiveness

Team performance is a reflection of how that team is coached, led, or managed. So why aren’t we paying more attention to how leaders and managers coach? Why isn’t their performance quantified? Even for organizations that understand the impact of coaching, there is still a big question mark surrounding effective program implementation. What coaching activities should leaders be doing, how often should they be doing them, and how well are they doing them? Coaching is no longer a soft skill, and these questions can and should be definitively answered. The competencies of front-line employees are constantly being quantified, but the workplace of the future will also quantify behaviors and expose the effectiveness of the leaders. Backed by the data of over 80,000 coaching interactions in the workplace, we will share a myriad of information on how a leader can make the shift to “coach.”
Coaching: No Longer a Skill

Coaching: No Longer a Skill

The role of the manager as a coach is misunderstood in most every sales department. While “coaching” is being taught, it is limited in scope and lacks metrics that prove coaching effectiveness and outcomes.
Bill will share how the manager role has become archaic and why sales departments need to eliminate the role or adopt a high growth coaching model.
The Coaching Effect Academy - All Day Session

The Coaching Effect Academy - All Day Session

The Coaching Effect Academy is a one day intensive session that will provide the foundation for improved coaching that is essential to growing your team’s performance. At the end of this day, attendees will walk away with:
1. An introduction to the three drivers of creating a performance environment
2. An understanding of the impact of effective coaching on team results
3. The information, best practices, and tools leaders need to efficiently execute all coaching effect activities.
Psychological Safety
Psychological Safety
For centuries, leadership experts have studied teamwork - strategy, communication, cooperation, etc. - and have found that certain groups operate more effectively than others. But now we're learning there's something more, something deeper, that distinguishes top-performing teams: psychological safety.

Based on more than a decade of research working with hyper-growth and peak-performing teams in the worlds of business and sport, Bill Eckstrom presents a practical, authentic, and real-life approach to the impact psychological safety has on team performance.

He will share how psychological safety affects the growth of individuals and teams, as well as the role coaches/leaders play in its creation or destruction.

Attendees will learn:

Why psychological safety may be the most important discovery in organizational behavior

How psychological safety impacts sales results

What specific behaviors and actions can create or perpetuate a psychologically safe environment

Topics

Business Growth Strategies & Trends Trending
Leadership Trending
Navigating Change & Uncertainty Trending

TED-Talks

Why comfort will ruin your life | Bill Eckstrom | TEDxUniversityofNevada

Why Leaders Should Not Let Their People Become Too Comfortable

"Similar arguments are made by Bill Eckstrom and Sarah Wirth in their forthcoming book, The Coaching Effect. Eckstrom and Wirth, respectively founder and vice-president of EcSell Institute, which advises organizations on how coaching can help drive performance, argue that a big part of the problem is management itself."

Why Comfort Will Ruin Your Business

Coaches must have the ability to persevere through discomfort and disruption.

The Co-Authors of ‘The Coaching Effect' Offer the Key Questions to Glean Effective Feedback

If we could offer only one piece of advice to managers and coaches who want to improve the way they provide feedback to their team members, it would be to ask more questions. This can be a lot harder than it sounds.

Coach More, Manage Less

Career development discussions improve productivity and retention.

The Art of Effective Feedback: 7 Strategies Every Manager Should Embrace

What separates the best managers from the rest? Our research shows that they coach more and manage less. In other words, they support, teach, and challenge their team members to achieve their goals. One of the key skills of being an effective coach is the ability to deliver helpful feedback. However, giving good feedback at work is a challenging skill to master.

Combating Disengagement: What can be done about workers' lack of interest in their jobs?

EcSell Institute's studies show that the stronger a sale rep agrees with the statement, “My manager cares about me as a person, not just a sales producer,” the higher that rep performs.

Turn Your Managers Into High-Growth Coaches With These 4 Steps

Through our decades of business research, we've discovered that nothing elevates performance more than coaching. Any organization, division, or team can implement a coaching process that leads to greater growth and increased revenue. Of course, putting such a system in place requires thoughtful planning. Here are four steps to establishing a coaching process that is teachable, measurable, and leads to the creation of more high-growth coaches.

4 Steps to Improving the Quality of Your Coaching

Nothing elevates performance more than coaching. Over the past decade, through studying more than 100,000 coaching interactions, we have found that coaching – as opposed to managing – is key to driving extraordinary results. There is no question that coaches develop and inspire people to do their best work, and they obtain more discretionary effort than managers. Fortunately, any business, division or team can implement a coaching process that is teachable, measurable, and leads to the creation of more high-growth coaches by following these four steps.

2019 The Coaching Effect : What Great Leaders Do to Increase Sales, Enhance Performance, and Sustain Growth

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“Bill - I call him by his first name because I/we felt a real connection with him and his real life approach to speaking to our varsity coaches at Humber College. The discussion around discomfort leading to growth was totally applicable to our entire coaching staff, regardless of the team they coached or position they held. Bill's speaking style is collaborative in nature which ensured all of us felt we were part of the very lively discussion. Through research, humor, and true stories he was able to translate his message reserved for business executives into the world of college sport. It's without hesitation that I recommend Bill and his speaking abilities. We will for sure have him back - both as a guest speaker but also as a fan! Best seats in the house - on Humber. Thanks Bill! GO HAWKS!”

Associate Director Athletics & Recreation, HUMBER COLLEGE

“Bill Eckstrom, who spoke for us at TEDxUniversityofNevada 2017, is in the top 5% of over 100 speakers that have participated in our program. Bill was a joy to work with because he was sincerely interested in our needs, and he made our goal his goal. When you work with Bill, you don't just get a speaker, you get a valuable long-term relationship with a true professional. He has earned my highest recommendation.”

Brett Simmons, Curator, TEDx UNIVERSITY OF NEVADA

"I was thankful to spend a few hours listening to Bill Eckstrom at our Athletic Coaches retreat where Bill was the Keynote Speaker. Not only was Bill articulate, knowledgeable and funny he managed to capture the room (full of A-type personalities) and keep us tuned in for his entire presentation - not an easy task. His ability to keep us focused with his stories, experience and on topic speaking points allowed all of us to learn more than a few tips and tricks to take back to our own respective teams. Bill is easily one of the top speakers I've had the privilege of listening to and would easily return to another event in the future! Thanks again Bill."

Head Coach, HUMBER COLLEGE

“Our organization puts on eleven events/year for business leaders; bringing them a keynote with excellent takeaways and actionable suggestions for their business and lives. Bill Eckstrom brought us a fresh and informative keynote with great ideas for our audience to help in their personal growth as leaders. Bill's deep research and great stories make his talk engaging and credible, while his concise suggestions and takeaways are very useful. Bill is an engaging speaker, brings pertinent visuals and a very personable presence. I highly recommend his keynote, ‘Becoming Comfortable with Discomfort' to companies and organizations looking for ideas to grow their teams and personal skills and increase productivity.”

Jacki Hallerback, Executive Director at WINevada

“Bill did a great job; what impressed me most was how he really prepped in getting to know who our audience is. He tailored his message so it really resonated with them. He was extremely professional, not least early for everything, which I like! Moreover, the audience really picked up on the message and talked about it or referenced it throughout the week. I'd have no hesitation in recommending Bill.”

Simon Mayle, Event Director of ILTM. ILTM North America September 2018.

“Bill Eckstrom brings an innovative approach that helps organizations achieve higher team performance. Instead of simply focusing on salespeople Bill contends that it's the sales managers that should be developed and held accountable in order to increase sales And, the data shows that he is exactly right. Bill will challenge the way you view performance and growth, but the results will speak for themselves. Also, Bill is a great guy and pleasure to work with and be around.”

Steve B. Global VP of Sales & Marketing

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Bill Eckstrom

Bio

Keynotes

The Growth Rings: Becoming Comfortable With Discomfort

Topics

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Kaplan Mobray

Margie Warrell, PhD

Let's find your perfect speaker!

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Bill Eckstrom

Bio

Keynotes

The Growth Rings: Becoming Comfortable With Discomfort

Leadershift: Exposing Coaching Effectiveness

Coaching: No Longer a Skill

The Coaching Effect Academy - All Day Session

Psychological Safety

Topics

Similar Speakers

Kaplan Mobray

Margie Warrell, PhD

Let's find your perfect speaker!

Explore

Quick Links

Keep Up To Date