Kathryn Goetzke, MBA
Kathryn Goetzke is Chief Hope Officer of The Shine Hope Company, the Author of ‘The Biggest Little Book About Hope‘, podcast host of The Hope Matrix, Creator of award winning Hopeful Minds, Hopeful Cities, and Hopeful Mindsets, Social Entrepreneur, Chief Mood Officer, and Business Strategist. In 2004, launched Mood-lites™, a brand that achieved over 35 million dollars in retail sales and ran the first cause marketing campaign for mental health. She was recently appointed to represent the World Federation for Mental Health at the United Nations, representing the almost 1 billion people around the world with mental health disorders.
Kathryn is a global mental health ambassador, overcoming her own battles with depression, anxiety, ADHD, PTSD and addictions through therapy, medication, lifestyle changes, support, and learning how to hope. She lost her father to suicide at 18 and knows all too well the negative consequences of untreated mental health on both the self and the family system. And she understands the power of hope.
Ms. Goetzke began her career with 3M Corporation in research, and moved to lead rebranding IDS mutual funds to American Express, had a role in advertising account management, and moved to serve as the VP of Sales and Marketing for Compass Marketing. She then launched her own company and brand, with a social impact model before social impact was even around.
Kathryn and her work have been featured in Entrepreneur Magazine, Home, InStyle, Scholastic Choices Magazine, and others. She has spoken at the United Nations, the Global Mental Health Movement Conference in Athens and South Africa, at Mental Health Community Associations Conference, The Kennedy Forum, The World Bank, the Scent Marketing Institute, and more. She has been featured on multiple radio and television shows including BBC, WGN Chicago, CBS Chicago, Tasty Trade, and eWomenNetwork. Ms. Goetzke serves on advisory boards for FundaMentalSDG, Y Mental Health, Women’s Brain Project, and the Global Mental Health Movement, and on the board of Hope Means Nevada.
Ms. Goetzke is most proud of her work for Hopeful Minds, a program iFred developed to teach Hope to kids based on research it is a teachable skill, and featured as an innovation by the World Bank. As hopelessness is the primary predictor of suicide and #1 symptom of depression, learning how to create, maintain, and grow a hopeful mindset is critical to prevention of anxiety, depression, and suicide. iFred sees Hope as a Human Right and is committed to making it no cost and available to all youth around the world.
