Positive Instigation Coaching Program
The Positive Instigation Coaching Program by Chitra Ragavan is a premier executive leadership experience built for transformation at the highest level.
High-stakes leadership requires more than resilience. It requires reinvention.
This isn’t traditional executive and leadership coaching.
Where traditional coaching can feel open-ended or abstract, Positive Instigation is a tailored, high-intensity, and outcome-oriented premium coaching program.
It combines the strategic precision of executive advising, the transformational depth of coaching, and the human warmth of mentorship, all in service of helping you clear roadblocks, lead with bold conviction, and obtain an exponential return on your investment.
Find Your Pommel Horse and Master It
All elite performers have their pommel horse: the one thing they do at an Olympic level. Gymnast Stephen Nedoroscik mastered the pommel horse, as he led the U.S. Olympic team to a medal in the 2024 Olympics, with the New York Times writing,
“Teammates referred to him as a ‘positive instigator.’”
Through the Positive Instigation Leadership Coaching Program, Chitra Ragavan helps leaders find and master their pommel horse.
Choose Your Rewire
Leadership
Rewire
Strategy
Rewire
Strategy Rewire transforms how leaders think about positioning, decision-making, and long-term impact.
Brand
Rewire
Advisory
Rewire
Corporate
Rewire
The Corporate Rewire is a bespoke, company-wide engagement designed to strengthen your organization’s strategy, leadership, and brand at scale.
The Power of Coaching
Recent empirical research supports the effectiveness of leadership coaching in enhancing individual and organizational outcomes. A 2023 meta-analysis published in the Academy of Management Learning and Education examined 37 randomized controlled trials and found that workplace coaching leads to significant improvements in performance, well-being, goal attainment, self-efficacy, and resilience (Jones et al., 2023).
The Positive Instigation Method™ is a proprietary executive coaching and leadership coaching approach for bold thinkers who are ready to lead with courage, clarity, and conviction. Through an intentional and challenging rhythm of questioning, reflection, and narrative excavation, this method creates space for strategic insight and personal evolution. Built on a foundation of deep listening and creative rigor, the Positive Instigation Method surfaces what’s buried, reframes conventional wisdom, and triggers bold change. It’s a method for rewiring how you lead, decide, communicate, and build, from the inside out.
The Halo Strategy is a core pillar of the method, giving clients a clear way to define what they stand for, strengthen how they are perceived, and elevate their influence. Reverse the Flow is a proprietary technique we use to reposition a leader, company, or brand by starting with the problem only they can solve and building outward to reshape how others see their value.
Who I Help
The Positive Instigation Coaching Program is a high-touch, high-trust premium investment that builds sharper strategic judgment, stronger brand authority, and more effective communication to boost performance and inspire confidence among boards, investors, employees, and teams. This executive coaching and leadership program is designed for leaders operating at maximum velocity, complexity, and pressure.
Corporate Leaders
In an era of constant disruption, shrinking trust in leadership, and accelerating technological and geopolitical change, high-stakes leadership has become a survival skill.
Drawing on decades of media and storytelling expertise, and her proprietary Positive Instigation Method, Chitra helps executives clarify their narrative, align perception with purpose, and convert strategy into trust, influence, and traction.
The result is measurable ROI with stronger decision-making, higher credibility, and a competitive edge that endures through volatility.
The Positive Instigation Coaching Program is a highly tailored, three-month, high-impact alternative to traditional executive programs that are long-drawn out, nebulous in structure, and may not offer a systematic path to change.
Startup Founders
In a world of scarce capital, aggressive competition, and relentless technological change, especially the accelerating impact of AI, founders are under unprecedented pressure to perform, persuade, and scale fast.
Using her proprietary Positive Instigation Method and five core modules — Leadership Rewire, Strategy Rewire, Brand Rewire, Advisory Rewire, and Corporate Rewire — Chitra helps founders sharpen judgment, master communication, and develop the emotional resilience required to lead through volatility.
Chitra teaches founders how to articulate their mission, connect their narrative to their mission and their investment pitch deck, and build trust with investors, teams, and partners.
The result: measurable, exponential ROI through stronger leadership presence, greater investor confidence, and scalable, culture-driven growth that endures beyond funding cycles.
Venture Capitalists
In a market defined by scarce capital, volatile valuations, ruthless competition, and relentless technological disruption, especially the breakneck pace of AI, investing in leadership is no longer optional; it’s a survival necessity.
Using her proprietary Positive Instigation Method, Chitra helps founders shape the narrative that attracts capital, talent, and trust when traction is still emerging.
Drawing on decades of media, storytelling, and brand-strategy expertise, she teaches venture managers how to build their portfolio with intention, inspire, manage, and support their portfolio companies, build their own strategic position in the venture marketplace to attract major investment capital, how to communicate their vision with precision, align internal teams, and build investor confidence through transparent, high-integrity leadership.
The result: more fundable founders, faster scaling, and higher portfolio valuations, with leadership as a true performance multiplier.
National Security Leaders
In an era of domestic polarization, global instability, and fragile public confidence, law enforcement and national security leaders face an increasingly unpredictable threat matrix, fueled by social media amplification, lone actors, foreign interference in domestic politics and destabilization campaigns.
Drawing on her years covering intelligence and federal law enforcement agencies and developing media and storytelling expertise, Chitra helps leaders build the trust and alignment essential for effective national security decision-making. Using her proprietary Positive Instigation Method, she helps officials translate values into actions that reinforce integrity, accountability, and readiness.
The result is leadership that restores credibility, sustains morale, rebuilds public trust, and strengthens institutions amid chaos, volatility, and eroding public trust.
Media Leaders
At a time of record low public trust, constant accusations of media bias, and a fractured information ecosystem, today’s media leaders operate under continuous political pressure, social-media outrage cycles, and an unforgiving 24-hour news climate.
A nationally recognized journalist with decades in mainstream media and deep leadership expertise, Chitra brings the rare combination of journalistic judgment and coaching insight that few coaches offer. Using her proprietary Positive Instigation Method, she helps executives navigate high-velocity decision-making, sharpen editorial judgment, and strengthen newsroom culture under scrutiny.
The result is measurable ROI: stronger crisis navigation, clearer communication, and leadership that protects both mission and reputation in an age of relentless visibility and political fire.
Military Leaders
As the world confronts rapidly shifting geopolitical alliances, technological disruption, and internal uncertainty, senior military and defense leaders face an unprecedented threat landscape, from low-cost, all-pervasive drone warfare to the use of AI leveraged by foreign actors, counterintelligence risks, and growing internal distrust of our intelligence apparatus.
With deep experience covering intelligence and national security as a journalist, advising national security startups, and her decades of media expertise, Chitra Ragavan applies her proprietary Positive Instigation Method to help officers, senior enlisted leaders, and civilian leaders strengthen their command narrative, make principled decisions under pressure, and communicate with moral authority.
The program develops leadership that can adapt to complexity while inspiring confidence across the chain of command.
The outcome: stronger alignment, steadier teams, and trust that endures through disruption and turbulence, safeguarding mission integrity, esprit de corps, and national security.
Athletes
In an era of relentless media exposure, escalating financial stakes, and instantaneous public judgment, the spotlight on athletes and sports executives has never been harsher.
Every decision — from contracts and sponsorships to controversial trades, halftime entertainment, and public statements or gestures — can spark polarization or damage trust.
The Positive Instigation Coaching Program helps athletes, coaches, and team leaders turn that scrutiny into strength and visibility into lasting influence. Using her proprietary Positive Instigation Method, Chitra Ragavan helps leaders articulate the deeper narrative that drives them, connecting personal purpose with public perception and leadership decision-making.
Drawing on decades of media and storytelling expertise, she equips them to navigate crisis moments, manage reputational risk, and lead with integrity under pressure.
The result: measurable ROI through stronger team cohesion, elevated sponsor and fan trust, and leadership that sustains excellence, credibility, and composure on and off the field, preventing reputational crises before they erupt.
Program Design
The full Leadership, Strategy, and Brand Rewires include:
- A welcome package of personalized notebook, refillable keepsake pen, mouse pad, and candle to help with inspiration and execution
- 7 structured coaching sessions over 3 months
- Custom readings, reflection exercises, and strategic tools
- Direct access to Chitra for feedback and alignment between sessions
- A comprehensive Final Report summarizing your insights, growth, and next steps
- A graduation gift of a book appropriate for each Rewire and a framed Certificate of Completion
This isn’t “drop-in” coaching. It’s a stringent, systematic, sympathetic guided process designed to rewire how you lead and make decisions.
The Advisory Rewire includes:
- Deep problem-solving consulting over 7 one-hour sessions
- Renewable 3-month package
- Final Report with insights and recommendations for each 3-month phase
The Corporate Rewire includes:
- Deep, focused engagement with leadership teams on specific challenges
- Renewable 3-month package
- Final Report with insights and recommendations for each 3-month phase
What We Work On
Every executive coaching and leadership coaching engagement is tailored but common themes include:
- Leading through ambiguity and high-stakes decision-making
- Strengthening confidence and narrative clarity
- Solving people and performance challenges
- Defining values and leadership operating principles
- Rebuilding founder identity after burnout, exits, or breakdowns
- Making bold moves with courage and confidence
- Clear path to getting an exponential return on investment
Sign Up for High-Octane Coaching and Consulting
We offer transformational Leadership, Strategy, Brand, Advisory, and Corporate Rewires based on the Positive Instigation Method, designed to turn bold thinkers into bold leaders. Let’s discuss our offerings from our one-on-one coaching rewires to our customized Corporate Advisory Rewire.