Ilona Birenbaum
Ilona Birenbaum is a leadership and organizational consultant/leadership coach with over 25 years of experience and a diverse organizational development background. She is an adjunct professor and coach with American University’s School of Public Affairs’ Key Executive Leadership Program. Her specialties include leadership coaching, facilitation, change management, leadership assessment and development, action learning, performance management, training, strategic planning, and conflict resolution.As a leadership coach, Ilona offers her clients a practical approach to solving such issues as communication, delegation, teamwork, conflict management, and strategic thinking. Through insightful questions, she helps her clients increase their self-awareness and enhance skills in managing themselves and others. Known for easily building rapport with senior leaders, Ilona combines her psychology and organizational development backgrounds with her business experience in working with senior leaders. As an organizational development consultant, Ilona is known for partnering with her clients to solve complex human capital challenges and develop customized solutions that will work in specific client environments.
Ilona has held leadership roles for American Management Systems (AMS) and Watson Wyatt Worldwide. As a principal with AMS and a senior consultant with Towers Watson she led multiple change initiatives, including the design and implementation of performance management systems, introduction of career development frameworks, development and leadership of train-the-trainer efforts for major change initiatives, development and management of leadership development programs within a corporate university, design and implementation of multiple employee surveys, and facilitation of hundreds of workshops, training sessions, and meetings.
Ilona has been published by the Washington Business Journal, the Association of Training and Development, and Washington CEO Magazine. She is a certified facilitator of the Drexler Sibbett Team Performance Model, MBTI, DISC, Lominger’s Voices, CCL’s 360º Assessments, Hay Group’s Emotional and Social Competency Inventory (ESCI), and is an Action Learning Coach. In April 2009, Ilona obtained her leadership coaching certificate through Georgetown University and holds a Professional Certified Coach Certificate through ICF.
Ilona earned her Bachelor of Arts in Psychology and a Masters of Labor and Industrial Relations from Michigan State University. She is fluent in Russian and enjoys yoga, travel, reading, and spending time with her family.