Harvard, thanks for having me!

I hope you enjoyed the talk and feel ready to step back into your main character energy.If you want to keep pivoting and shimmying with me, here are a few options:

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Continue to learn more about me

You might find this hard to believe but...

Self-Awareness might be the most effective form of leadership training

I show audiences how to write their own story, keep their best people, and create spaces where everyone feels like they belong.

Tell me if this sounds familiar

You've built a life and career on being the one people can count on.You show up. You deliver. You carry the weight when things fall apart.Because if YOU don't, WHO will?And then one day, it hits you: you've become an extra in your own story.How did you get here, and how can you make a change?

Here's the thing we rarely even think about...

You probably didn't choose these patterns.
Most likely, you inherited them.
From your family, your friends, your education, your job, or somewhere else.

And until you can see the narratives running the show, you'll continue being in the passenger seat of your own life.

Leadership without Self-Awareness

Can you afford the costs?

One of the biggest reasons we lose our best people isn't because they stop caring, but because they're watching you quietly fall apart and assuming that's what success requires.

What will the people around you think when they see you...

  • Skip lunch

  • Cancel therapy appointments

  • Apologize for taking parental leave

  • Work through grief

Here's what those around you learn:

"This is what it takes to matter here."

We can't keep thinking of self-awareness as a "nice-to-have" anymore.Because the truth is that choosing yourself isn't selfish. It's leadership.It's the skill that determines whether you build cultures people stay for or cultures people survive until they can leave. Our capacity to lead, to connect, to retain the people we need most—it's limited by our willingness to be curious about ourselves.To look at the stories we inherited and ask: Are these mine? Or am I just carrying someone else's baggage?

2026 Signature Keynote

Pivot & Shimmy

Learn The Leadership Skill That Builds A Culture People Stay For

Organizations don't lose talent because people stop caring. They lose talent because leaders unintentionally model unsustainable ways of working-and call it "professionalism."In this keynote, I show the process for becoming a self-aware leader who can build trust, keep people engaged, and stop themselves from burning out.When leaders learn to choose themselves with intention, they give their teams permission to do the same.What The Audience Gets:

  • Deep understanding of how leadership behavior drives retention-and why "leading by example" backfires when the example is burnout

  • Ability to identify unconscious patterns in narratives that keep them stuck in cycles of that lead to burnout

  • A powerful, memorable, and immediately usable framework for self-awareness and decision making clarity

  • A complete toolkit to create a culture where people feel valued and want to stay

👋 Hi! It's nice to meet you.

I'm Erica C. Chen

...and I'm on a mission to make sure no one ever has to feel alone.

I'm a keynote speaker, community strategist, and former corporate leader who helps organizations rethink burnout, leadership, and belonging.Before stepping into my dream of becoming a professional speaker, I spent over a decade managing large-scale communities and leading teams in high-growth environments. I saw firsthand how outdated systems quietly exhaust high performers—especially parents and caregivers—while rewarding the appearance of having it all together.Today, I mostly speak but also consult with organizations and leadership teams on building human-centered cultures that support sustainable performance, retention, and trust. I'm known for relatable storytelling and practical frameworks that blend lived experience, leadership insight, and unflinching honesty to help audiences reconnect with what actually makes work sustainable.I don't just talk about self-awareness. I show leaders how to practice it—even when the systems around them weren't built for it.