At Change Essentials we believe in change that works...
Inclusive change that involves the right stakeholders
Change that lasts and change that generates your desired results
Founded in 2015 by Sara Keenan, Change Essentials LLC is a woman-owned small business (WOSB) established in Northern Virginia dedicated to managing change effectively. Our DUNS number is 079875780.
Organizations we have helped
Why chooose us?
We specialize in supporting leaders navigate complex changes at the individual, team or organizational level
While ensuring they have the capacity and resilience to thrive rather than merely survive the changes coming at them.
Sometimes you want to change to make things better for yourself or your organization and sometimes you have to change to survive. We have all faced changes that were executed poorly and seen or experienced the debilitating and demoralizing results.
As human beings, most of us don’t like change – it has a strong emotional component to it that can be stressful, scary and confusing so we resist.
Sara Keenan
Founder
Experienced management consultant and leadership coach with more than 20 years of experience leading change and delivering results in large and small organizations. Sara founded Change Essentials in 2015 to provide effective change management support to senior leaders in federal and commercial organizations.
Experience
Executive Leadership
Sara Keenan has 20+ years of experience running teams and business units in fast growing organizations, and supporting leaders who drive change in their organizations. She partners with clients in practical ways to deliver results that last.
She specializes in strengthening employee engagement and commitment, and solidifying organizational alignment and resilience when an organization or team faces significant change.
She has led large change management, leadership development and performance improvement programs while working for various consulting firms, federal agencies and international corporations.
Specialties
Leadership coaching
Trained in change management, organization development and leadership coaching through Georgetown University, Sara can seamlessly navigate from building out high level strategic change plans to cascading down what those changes mean to individuals.
Sara integrates strengthening resilience into all her work to cultivate stronger individuals and organizations. She listens deeply to allow people to open up and share their thoughts and feelings in a safe, non-judgmental fashion. She builds meaningful collaborative relationships built on honesty, trust and respect.
Background
Organizational change and human rights
From a young age Sara was fascinated by how people interact with one another as she watched her large family’s dynamics in their small kitchen in Ireland. Interested in understanding human behavior and committed to human dignity, Sara specialized in studying organizational change and leadership coaching in Georgetown University, and human rights in her Master’s in Law Program.
She is committed to enabling people to be more effective as individuals, as team members, as leaders and as human beings. She partners with leaders to ensure change is managed in organizations in ways that generate desired results and a better work experience for everyone. Sara’s organizational work on communications and teams has been published in Jossey-Bass’ consulting annuals in 2003 and 2009.
Education

BA Honors Degree in European Business Studies
University of Ulster at Coleraine, Northern Ireland

Master’s Degree in International Law Specializing in Human Rights and Emergency Law
Queen's University, Belfast, Northern Ireland
Certificates
Resilient Leadership® Certified Coach
Radical Collaboration® Certified Facilitator
The Five Behaviors of a Cohesive Team™ (Certified Practitioner)
Conflict Dynamics Profile (Certified Facilitator)
Emotional Intelligence EQi 2.0® & EQi 360® (Certified Practitioner)
Myers-Briggs (MBTI®) (Certified Practitioner)
Center for Creative Leadership 360 Suite of Assessments
PDI’s 360 Assessment: Profilor
Consulting team

Charles Kemp
COO (Chief Operating Officer)

Rhonda Hess
Executive Consultant

Tracey Cairnie
Executive Consultant

Marialane Schultz
Executive Consultant

Tom Finn
Executive Consultant
