Katie isn't just a coach who appreciates design. She's lived it. For 14 years, her family called a 1908 Frank Lloyd Wright home their own. It was a structure built on Wright's "organic architecture" philosophy of creating spaces "purposely in harmony with humanity and its environment." She even gave her son Sage the middle name Wright.
That experience shaped Katie's understanding that how we design our spaces directly impacts how we live our lives.
Whether living on the river, a redesigned loft in an old jewelry factory, or a row house built in 1820, she applies the same intentionality to her living space that she teaches her clients to apply to their lives: "The true artwork is nature, so we provided a minimalist, quiet canvas to showcase its allure and beauty. Simplicity quiets our minds and soothes our souls in what can often be a harried and frantic world." She curates her spaces, allowing what is both functional and beautiful in.
Katie understands that architects and designers pour themselves into creating spaces that elevate others—often at the expense of creating lives that elevate themselves.
Katie's 1:1 coaching helps creative professionals:
Katie's corporate training addresses firm-wide challenges:
deLIBERATE Productivity for Design Teams:
Help your team move from reactive chaos (responding to every client email instantly) to intentional productivity (focused work that produces better designs).
Sustainable Performance Without Burnout:
Address the "deadline culture" head-on. Teach teams how to deliver excellent work without sacrificing their health and relationships.
Leadership Self-Care for Principals & Partners:
Model sustainable practices from the top. Principals who prioritize wellbeing create cultures where teams can thrive.
Women in Architecture & Design:
Address the unique challenges women face in a male-dominated industry—from imposter syndrome to impossible standards.
You can't create from empty. Katie teaches you how to refill your creative wells instead of draining them dry project after project.
You need boundaries to do your best work. But you're afraid boundaries will cost you the client. Katie teaches you how to set limits that actually strengthen relationships and shift from client servant to service.
"Good enough" feels impossible when you're creating someone's dream home or designing a building that will stand for decades. Katie helps you discern when excellence matters and when perfectionism is just self-punishment.
Katie's philosophy: "Asking yourself how you want to live, how you want to experience your space, [and] what you need to feel supported by your home" applies to both the spaces you design and the life you're living.
As Katie says: "Embrace your home as an opportunity for self-care." The same applies to your practice, your projects, your schedule, your boundaries.
From her years in the Frank Lloyd Wright home, her designing diverse homes, and her work with countless architects and interior designers, Katie learned:
Based on work with architecture and design professionals:
Let's Be Real
You've heard the term "self-care." You probably even know a little bit about it. You know you should prioritize it more. You add it to your offensively long to-do list, reassuring yourself that you will get to it, only to have it cascade to the very bottom again.
You know you should make healthy decisions. That your mental and physical health are important.
But when it comes to self-care, most of us are asleep.
Lulled into complacency by the deluded promise that tomorrow will be different. That is, until a massive personal tragedy or crisis wakes us up and scares the hell out of us.
Katie McDonald believes it doesn't have to be that way.
The Wake-Up Call
If you're ready to stop sleepwalking (and you are), this speech will hit you like a sound-barrier-shattering alarm clock with a busted snooze button.
You'll learn how to liberate yourself from destructive, self-sacrificing habits by being deLIBERATE in your self-care. This speech will challenge you to take action in your own life—immediately—and give you the tools you need to do it.
What if you stopped apologizing and started advocating for yourself?
Aren't you curious what life would be like when you are truly nourished by your habits and mindset? When you walk out of this speech, you'll emerge refreshed, alive with purpose and a contagious passion to show up for yourself the way you show up for everyone else.
What Attendees Will Learn:
Perfect for:
Industries that love this keynote:
The Reality Check
You love to get things done. It's who you are and how you roll. But sometimes you wonder if it's all doable.
Meeting after meeting, deal after deal, deadline after deadline. Tasks topple your bulging inbox and demand more and more from you. It might feel like you have to choose between taking care of business and taking care of yourself.
Maybe you're starting to come undone in service to getting things done.
Katie McDonald learned the hard way that it doesn't have to be that way. Circling the drain, Katie's addiction to doing took her to hell. She returned scorched and emboldened to share with her tribe of doers what she learned along the way.
What This Keynote Delivers
This engaging keynote empowers audiences with time-tested strategies to reclaim the ME in tiME management and shift from human doing to human being.
Attendees learn:
Katie doesn't speak from theory. She speaks from the ashes of her own burnout and rebuild. She knows what it's like to circle the drain. To be so addicted to doing that you lose yourself completely.
This Keynote is:
The Problem Your Audience Is Facing
They're drowning. Meeting after meeting, deal after deal, deadline after deadline. Tasks topple their bulging inbox demanding more and more. They wonder if it's all even doable.
They might feel like they have to choose between taking care of business and taking care of themselves. Maybe they're starting to come undone in service to getting things done.
Frenzy has become familiar. An old friend. The electric current of their life that they tell themselves is enthusiasm, motivation, drive. The pacing, the racing. But it's ineffective time management masquerading as productivity.
They're plowing ahead as if to cross some imaginary finish line that only moves further away with any progress.
What This Keynote Delivers
Through de-LIBERATE, Katie helps audiences trade chaos for intention. This keynote dismantles reactivity and teaches a practical system for aligning calendars, commitments, and self-respect.
Attendees learn:
Her talk was more than a keynote; it was a reset. It prepared everyone to look inward before turning outward. That's the effect Katie has: she grounds people so they can rise higher.
Tania A. Doub, Mindful Quadrant