Ross Johnston is an executive coach, facilitator, and leadership consultant with more than 25 years of senior leadership experience across Canada, the United States, and the United Kingdom. He has led businesses, organizations, and large teams through growth, transformation, and significant change—and has been accountable for delivering the business outcomes that came with them. Ross doesn’t coach leadership from the sidelines; he has lived it, led it, and delivered results through people.
That experience shapes how Ross works with leaders today. He understands the reality of leadership when the stakes are high, the answers aren’t obvious, and the responsibility ultimately sits with you. Throughout his career, he has built high-performing teams, developed leaders, shaped talent strategies, and led organizational and system-wide change across regional, national, and global environments. He brings the strategic perspective of enterprise leadership together with the practical understanding of what it takes to turn strategy into results through people.
As a certified and ICF-qualified executive coach, Ross works with C-suite, executive, and senior leaders navigating greater responsibility, growth, transition, and change. He also holds an Executive MBA from the University of Bradford in the United Kingdom, where his dissertation focused on organizational cultural change and leadership systems. His coaching is grounded in authentic leadership and the belief that effective leadership starts with knowing who you are, what you stand for, and the impact you have on others. He helps leaders turn that self-awareness into greater confidence, presence, influence, accountability, and results.
Ross also works with emerging leaders and leadership teams. He facilitates practical, engaging leadership experiences that help emerging leaders make the critical transition from being successful themselves to achieving success through others. With leadership teams, he helps build the trust, clarity, alignment, communication, and shared accountability needed to move from a group of individuals to a genuinely high-performing team.
Whether coaching an executive, developing an emerging leader, or facilitating a leadership team, Ross brings real-world leadership experience, honest conversation, practical tools, and a focus on turning insight into action. He challenges leaders to look beyond what they are doing and consider the impact they are having—and what their leadership makes possible for the people and organization around them.
Away from work, Ross’s greatest enjoyment is time with his family. He loves being at the family cottage on the lake, cooking and entertaining family and friends, and simply being together. He is also passionate about sport, particularly golf and soccer—both as a participant and a fan.