Lisa C. Willis is a retired WNBA player, Gold Medalist, and bestselling author who uses sports philosophies to assist CEOs, management teams and people, just like you, to emerge as dominant leaders!
Lisa C. Willis
Mental Performance Coach, Executive Coach, Resilience Thought Leader & Speaker
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Locker Room Based Leadership Signature Programs!
You don't have to be an elite athlete to understand that the real mental work, preparation and game plan/strategy of a successful team happens behind the scenes; it happens in the locker room. The same applies to your organizations success. The LRB Leadership program is designed to give your leaders and well as team members the behind-the-scenes mental and emotional tools to perform at their highest levels.
NOT SURE WHERE TO START?
No worries.
That's where I come in.
Welcome!
Hi, I’m Lisa C. Willis — your POWERFUL Mindset Expert.
I'm a mental performance coach who has helped sports athletes, educational athletes, and corporate athletes perform powerfully. My POWERFUL approach, which stands for positive, original, willing, empowered, resilient, fearless and focused, unrelenting, and a leader, has helped hundreds of clients achieve their full potential both on and off the field.
I'm proud to say that I have an impressive list of accolades that include being a record holder at UCLA, a USA gold medalist, first round WNBA draft pick, WNBA three-point leader, and European national champion. I'm also the first woman to coach in the NY Knicks franchise and a best-selling author.
My mission is to help all athletes*, even those who are just athletic in spirit, become "powerful" and put out their best work. With my experience as a mental performance coach for professional teams, school leaders, and corporate executives, I have the expertise to help my clients achieve their goals.
As a bestselling author, executive coach, and corporate trainer, I've shared my expertise in mindset coaching and helped many athletes* achieve their full potential. I believe that every athlete has the power to perform powerfully and it's my job to help them unleash that potential.
Welcome!
Hi, I’m Jasmine — your Six Figure Storyteller Expert .
Featured twice by Forbes, and described as:
I’m the CEO of The EMPACT Group, LLC, a seven-figure coaching and consulting brand. As a writing consultant and coach for over 1,000 self-published authors, I’ve witnessed how every story can shift mindsets, break social strongholds, create generational change, and help you evolve into the leader you were meant to be.
I am a generational educator and publisher helping professional and aspiring authors become subject-matter storytellers, and teaching them how to package, market, and monetize their stories to impact and transform the world.
As a former middle school educator of 12 years, I leveraged my professional credentials, shared my story and built a seven figure business in the online space.
Today, I’ve made it my mission to help people just like you change the world one story at a time.
I think it’s time you shared yours.
In 2019, author, Lisa C. Willis made history as the first woman coach in the New York Knicks franchise. Willis is a retired WNBA player & a Gold Medalist who uses sports philosophies to assist CEOs, management & sports teams to emerge as dominant leaders!
In this book, you will be able to unpack the mindset & leadership qualities that allows Coach Willis to shatter glass ceilings. Believe it or not, she attributes the following abilities to her 20+ years playing, training, coaching and mentoring players and athletes:
Great communication skills
Ability to separate performance from self
Remarkable work ethic & discipline
High levels of resiliency Distinguish between one's worth and value, and one's role and identity
In 2019, author, Lisa C. Willis made history as the first woman coach in the New York Knicks franchise. Willis is a retired WNBA player & a Gold Medalist who uses sports philosophies to assist CEOs, management & sports teams to emerge as dominant leaders!
In this book, you will be able to unpack the mindset & leadership qualities that allows Coach Willis to shatter glass ceilings. Believe it or not, she attributes the following abilities to her 20+ years playing, training, coaching and mentoring players and athletes:
Great communication skills
Ability to separate performance from self
Remarkable work ethic & discipline
High levels of resiliency Distinguish between one's worth and value, and one's role and identity
Her socials:
2026 Lisa Willis
Keynote Speaker & Mental Performance Coach
The Mental Edge
That Separates
Good From Legendary
Turning Pressure Into Performance
Lisa C. Willis doesn't just talk about resilience. She has lived it at the highest level of professional sports. Her proprietary S.P.O.R.T. Method gives leaders, athletes, and organizations a repeatable system for transforming pressure into identity.
"The goal is not to avoid hot water. The goal is to become someone powerful enough to transform inside of it."
Trusted By
Hot
Water
How Elite Performers Turn Pressure Into Identity, Leadership, and Performance
When pressure hits, people don't reveal their character. They reveal their training. Using her proprietary S.P.O.R.T. Method, Lisa C. Willis takes audiences from surviving adversity to transforming inside of it. This is not a talk about motivation. It's a system for becoming someone pressure can't break.
"Talent might get you into the room, but resilience determines what happens when the room gets hot."
Audiences Leave With:
Close the gap between pressure and responseMake faster, clearer decisions under pressure without losing emotional control.
A personalized performance systemSustain elite results without burning out or dreading the game.
Step into expanded leadership with confidenceOwn new roles from day one instead of waiting to feel ready.
Build teams around shared identityDrive cohesion, accountability, and measurable results through a common framework.
The Framework
The S.P.O.R.T. Method
A repeatable, proprietary system for transforming pressure into performance, used in keynotes, workshops, and 1:1 executive coaching.
Separate the data from the drama. The story you tell yourself about pressure determines everything that follows. Failure is data. "I am a failure" is drama.
The Next Play Mentality. Resilience is movement. You cannot win the next play while emotionally living in the last one. Find the next viable action, even a small one.
Pressure is not punishment. It's redirection. Opportunities don't show up during comfort. They appear disguised as disruption. Keep your head up.
The hardest part of resilience is believing you deserve what comes after it. Shame closes your hands. Grace opens them. You cannot receive what you believe you are unworthy of holding.
Your history is your proof. Every adversity survived is a receipt. Trust who pressure forced you to become, because every hard thing prepared you for the next hard thing.
For Organizations
Corporate Leadership Development: From Individual Contributor to Confident Leader
Your highest performers are being promoted into leadership roles, often without the training to succeed in them. The result is burnout, team turnover, and leaders who default to old habits under pressure instead of leading with confidence.
The Program
A 10-month, in-person leadership development program for emerging leaders transitioning from individual contributor to people manager. Delivered through full-day, in-person intensives with the same cohort over the full engagement, built for transformation with evidence, not a one-time workshop.
"This program is built on the S.P.O.R.T. Method, the same framework that has guided my work with Nike, the NBA, and Fortune 500 leadership teams, applied specifically to the IC-to-manager transition."
Leaders Walk Away Able To:
- Know who they are as a leader, not who they think they're supposed to be
- Perform at their highest when the stakes are highest
- Have the hard conversations they've been avoiding
- Build trust and psychological safety on their teams without sacrificing accountability
- Lead through change and uncertainty with confidence
Credibility
- Proven inside Nike's WIN program, a Nike x WNBA retired players partnership
- Delivered by a retired WNBA player, USA Basketball Gold Medalist, and the first woman to coach in the New York Knicks organization
- Trusted by Nike, the NBA, T-Mobile, Ameriprise, and Blue Cross Blue Shield
Who It's For
Texas-based companies, 200 to 2,000 employees, partnering with HR, People, and L&D leaders to build their next generation of managers.
The Full Portfolio
More Ways to Bring Lisa C. Willis In
Every talk below draws from the S.P.O.R.T. Method and Lisa C. Willis's career at the highest levels of professional sport, leadership, and coaching. Each is available as a keynote, workshop, or multi-session series. Hover any talk for the full breakdown.
Corporate / Leadership
Separate the Data from the Drama
Decision-Making Under Pressure for Leaders
View Details
Leaders don't fail because of bad information. They fail because pressure turns data into drama, and drama kills clarity. This talk gives leaders a repeatable mental framework for cutting through emotional noise and making sharp decisions under heat.
- Identify when you're reacting to drama instead of data in real time
- The 3-step mental reset elite performers use between high-stakes moments
- Build a team culture that responds to facts, not fear
Corporate / Team Performance
Next Play Mentality
Building Teams That Recover Fast and Stay Focused
View Details
Resilience isn't bouncing back. It's knowing how to move when everything in you wants to freeze. This talk gives teams the mindset and tools of elite athletes: move forward before you feel ready, recover faster than your competition, and stop letting one setback become a losing streak.
- Why hesitation is more expensive than the wrong move
- The athlete's secret to resetting between high-pressure moments
- How to build organizational momentum after failure or disruption
Women's Leadership
Ready to Receive
Why High-Achieving Women Block Their Own Next Level
View Details
You did the work. You earned the seat. But the moment it arrives, a voice inside says "you don't belong here." This talk speaks directly to high-achieving women who are one permission slip away from stepping into everything they have prepared for, and helps them find that permission inside themselves.
- Recognize and dismantle imposter syndrome in real time
- The difference between humility and self-sabotage
- How to receive an expanded role without shrinking into it
Sports Organizations / Athletes
Identity Over Outcome
What Happens to Athletes When the Game Ends
View Details
When your whole life has been your sport, injury, retirement, or a bad season doesn't just affect your performance. It threatens your identity. Drawing directly from her ACL recovery and WNBA journey, Lisa C. Willis helps athletes reframe who they are so their next chapter is an expansion, not a loss.
- Detach performance from identity without losing competitive drive
- Rebuild confidence after injury, demotion, or career transition
- Carry the athlete's mental framework into every arena of life
Corporate / Culture
Become the Coffee Bean
Leadership That Transforms Environments, Not Just Survives Them
View Details
Some leaders soften when things get hard. Some harden and go cold. The rarest leaders do something different: they change the room. This talk unpacks what separates reactive managers from transformational leaders, and gives audiences the mindset shift to become the one who sets the temperature, not the one who responds to it.
- Identify your current default response to organizational pressure
- The three types of leaders in every crisis, and how to become the third
- Practical tools to shift team culture during high-stress periods
Youth / Education / Parents
Trust the Training
Building Mental Toughness in the Next Generation
View Details
Based on her children's book "The Adventures of Camille the Comeback Kid" and her earliest memory of failure, Lisa C. Willis delivers an accessible, high-energy talk for student athletes, young professionals, and the parents and coaches who shape them, giving the next generation their first real system for handling pressure.
- Failure is not the opposite of success. It's the beginning of it
- How to turn adversity into instruction at any age
- The mental habits that elite performers develop early
About Lisa C.
She Didn't Just
Study Resilience
Lisa C. Willis spent her career performing under the most unforgiving pressure in professional sports, as a retired WNBA three-point leader, UCLA Hall of Famer, and USA Basketball Gold Medalist. Resilience wasn't a concept she learned. It was a survival skill she developed.
After making history as a trailblazer with the New York Knicks organization, the first woman to coach in that organization, Lisa C. Willis channeled a decade of elite performance experience into a mental performance coaching practice, and eventually, a speaking career built around one simple truth: resilience is not random. It is a repeatable system.
Her S.P.O.R.T. Method has helped Fortune 500 leaders, professional athletes, and high-stakes executives close the gap between pressure and performance, not by avoiding the heat, but by learning to transform inside of it.
Social Proof
What People Are Saying
"I knew that once I was in a position to hire her, I would. Lisa C. Willis walked me through the pitch with my boss, from reaching out, to counter points and notes in the meeting, graphics, even picked out the picture, and stats to justify the desired salary. No matter how defeated I feel about an issue, I can count on feeling like a conquistador after talking with Lisa. Because great leaders create more leaders, and that's just who she is."
Nikeia MarksNBA G League, Director of Player Development
"The transformative presence of motivational speaker Lisa C. Willis shines as a beacon of inspiration, igniting hope and driving change across our team. The fact that she picked up a tangerine as a prop to talk about how we can be resilient as a team, the entire team was amazed at how gracefully she delivered the message. What sets her apart is her gift for communication and the ability to connect with the audience."
Mary RobertsTechnology Director, Nike Inc.
"Lisa C. Willis was a guest speaker and emcee at our recent all-team meeting. She brought the spark, the facts, and her authentic self. Our group benefited from her inspiring experiences with a championship mindset and how to be our true best selves. She also brought the energy and fun as our emcee. We are so lucky to have had such a superstar with us, and we cannot wait to hear from her again."
Michelle JockersSr. Administrative Assistant, Nike Inc.
"Lisa C. Willis is THAT girl...For Real!! Aside from her stellar background as a premier athlete, to her groundbreaking achievement as the FIRST female coach ever for the New York Knicks organization, she is a catalyst for innovation and a champion for change. She leads with compassion, invokes emotion with grace, and helps others transform with intention and integrity. Lisa C. Willis is a leader of leaders."
Yolanda MooreWNBA 2x Champion, Bestselling Author, Transformational Speaker
"Thank you for joining my Application Security Leadership meeting to bring us closer as a team. Your compelling, authentic, real world experience and examples really resonated. Lisa C. Willis collaborates with others to accelerate our business, builds trust across her network, and puts the team's success ahead of her own."
Dale ComptonSenior Director, Information Security Engineering
"Thank you Lisa C. Willis for the valuable insight you brought from a non-technical lens during the BEiT All Hands. You created an experience where any athlete can take what you said, resonate with it, and use it on the daily. You truly embody the Serve Athletes Maxim and Lisa acts in service of the athlete, seeks to always do better, connects sport to every day."
Akilah NormanLead, Analytics & Reporting
"Lisa C. Willis came to the BEiT all hands and spoke about her journey and what it is to truly be a champion. I loved the conversation and it inspired me. The authenticity was amazing to see and motivates me to show up as my true self more than before. She collaborates with others to accelerate our business, builds trust across her network, and puts the team's success ahead of her own. Thank you!"
Laray BelgraveSenior Administrative Assistant
"Watching Lisa C. Willis speak is amazing. She has the ability to connect with her audience in a way that makes them comfortable enough to share their own experiences. She shares her successes and challenges in a way that opens the door for authentic conversation. Her emphasis on taking ownership and being a leader motivates players who want to improve their game, on and off the court."
Student-Athlete ParentWorkshop Attendee
"My students enjoyed learning about leadership on and off the court. Students were amazed that Lisa C. Willis was a product of an LAUSD school. My boys couldn't believe that girls can excel in basketball. Lisa C. Willis captivates all audiences and students leave wanting to know when she will come back."
Sheronda DowdellPrincipal, LAUSD
"Hearing those words from Lisa C. Willis, and seeing someone who looks like her up there, meant so much to me. I was feeling uncertain about how to translate my sports background onto a resume, but she provided a high-energy, relatable playbook. Learning the S.P.O.R.T. Method to reset under pressure was incredibly insightful."
JadeUniversity of Colorado
"The Build Your Bowl menu was the most practical part of the session for me because it gave me specific LinkedIn and personal brand language. I had entered the workshop feeling anxious because I didn't have a Plan A locked down yet. This was a great, professional experience that helped me gain a much deeper understanding of my personal profile."
Demeara HindsClemson University
"I finally have a vocabulary to describe my value beyond 'playing ball,' which is a massive relief. Before the session, I was feeling anxious and pressured to have my post-grad plans completely figured out. The high-energy playbook and the S.P.O.R.T. Method were exactly what I needed."
Stailee HeardOklahoma State University
"This workshop brought so much light to both my basketball life and my outside life. I came in already feeling confident but looking for extra tools to level up. Lisa C. Willis's high-energy delivery was highly impactful, and the S.P.O.R.T. Method gave me a concrete way to reset under pressure."
Paula Lopez GonzalezUniversity at Buffalo
"I see exactly how my specific profile fits into certain careers now. Lisa C. Willis created an environment that felt so comfortable, I wasn't scared to share how I felt at any point in the room. Her high-energy playbook completely changed how I view my professional hardware."
Chloe MannGrand Canyon University
"This was a great workshop for preparing for the next steps in every season of life. I went in looking for extra tools to add to my foundation, and the S.P.O.R.T. Method gave me a highly practical mental strategy to reset under pressure. I feel much more strategic and in control of my professional future now."
Hannah StuelkeUniversity of Iowa
Ready to Book?
Bring the Mental Edge to Your Organization
Lisa C. Willis is available for keynotes, half-day and full-day workshops, multi-session corporate training programs, and executive coaching engagements.
Booking Inquiries
Keynote Fee
Available Upon Request
Based In
Austin, Texas, Available Nationwide
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