About Dr. Nicole Yeldell Butts
About Dr. Nicole
She makes it safe to tell the truth. Then she helps people move.
Dr. Nicole Yeldell Butts is a keynote speaker, host, and award-winning author whose work lives in the space between what's ending and what hasn't yet formed.
The Threshold
Nicole has spent more than 25 years inside organizations at the exact moment they were being asked to change, across corporate, nonprofit, higher education, and professional-services environments. Her leadership roles have included Human Resources Director, Chief Diversity Officer in higher education, and Vice President of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion in the nonprofit sector. She has led People & Culture offices, built enterprise-wide culture strategies, and guided culture transformations across healthcare, technology, manufacturing, higher education, and philanthropy.
Along the way, she noticed something most leadership development overlooks: organizations don't fail to change for lack of strategy. They fail at the threshold, the space after the old way has ended and before the new one has taken hold, where trust erodes and teams either freeze or fall apart. She also saw how organizations drift, as the values they state and the behavior their leaders model slowly grow apart.
That observation shaped her doctoral research in Organizational Change and Leadership at the University of Southern California, where she examined the role executives play in advancing organizational diversity, equity, and inclusion, work that sharpened her understanding of how leaders either rise to meet a threshold moment or default through it.
Her Own Threshold
Nicole knows the threshold not only as a researcher, but from experience. Four days before completing her doctorate, she was unexpectedly displaced from her executive role as Vice President of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion. She was becoming Dr. Nicole at the very moment she was no longer Vice President Nicole. Achievement and loss, becoming and letting go, all in the same space.
She had spent decades leading through change, studying it, and advising others through it. What she didn't yet have was language for the space she was in: something had ended, and whatever was next hadn't yet taken shape. Eventually, she gave that space a name: The Room Between. And when she began talking about it, women everywhere recognized themselves in it.
SHIFT and The Room Between
At the center of Nicole's work is a simple distinction: change and transformation are not the same thing. Change happens around us, sometimes by choice and sometimes without our permission. Transformation requires consciously engaging with what's changing and making intentional choices about what comes next.
That belief became SHIFT, her five-step framework for intentional transformation, expressed in two award-winning, bestselling books: SHIFT: A Five-Step Framework for Transforming Organizational Culture and SHIFT: A Transformational Journey from Playing Small to Unapologetically Thriving. It also led her to found The Room Between, a platform, podcast, and community for high-achieving women navigating life's major transitions. She is also a contributing author to The New C-Suite: Civil Leadership in Action.
What People Experience
Audiences trust Nicole within minutes. Guests open up on her podcast in ways they didn't expect to. After she speaks, there's almost always a line of people waiting to talk with her. Her presence isn't separate from her expertise; it's how her expertise shows up. She creates the conditions in which people tell the truth, and then she helps them move.
Today
Nicole works as a keynote speaker, host and moderator, and author, bringing her research-backed insight to corporations, conferences, professional associations, universities, and women's leadership events. She hosts The Room Between: Navigating Life's Transitions and writes for outlets including Essence and Black Enterprise. She also partners with a select number of organizations and executives each year through Leadership Advisory.
Credentials & Recognition
- Doctorate in Organizational Change and Leadership, University of Southern California
- Master's in Human Resources Development
- Certifications in coaching, strategic HR, and alternative dispute resolution
- Hustle & Heart Business Strategy Gold Award, SHIFT: A Five-Step Framework for Transforming Organizational Culture
- International Impact Book Award, SHIFT: A Transformational Journey from Playing Small to Unapologetically Thriving
- Speaker at numerous national and regional conferences, including SHRM Annual Conference & Expos, the American Council on Education (ACE) Women's Conference, and International CHRIE
- Featured in Essence, Black Enterprise, SHEEN, and Women's Journal
Nicole lives in Los Angeles with her husband. When she's not working, you'll find her traveling the world, enjoying live music, watching science fiction, or curled up with a good novel.
Introducing Dr. Nicole
For event hosts, a ready-to-use introduction:
Dr. Nicole Yeldell Butts is a keynote speaker, host, and award-winning author who helps organizations and people navigate the space between what's ending and what's next. A former C-suite leader with a doctorate in Organizational Change and Leadership from USC, she is the creator of the SHIFT framework, the author of two award-winning books, and the founder and host of The Room Between. Please welcome Dr. Nicole Yeldell Butts.
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