JIM BISHOP
Executive Leadership Speaker for Pharma, Biotech, and Agriculture
Transform Your Leadership Team With Keynotes and Workshops That Address the Identity-Level Patterns Driving Performance Under Pressure
WORKING WITH INDUSTRY LEADERS
Leadership Development That Goes Beneath the Surface
Most leadership talks stay at the surface. New frameworks. Better habits. Tips for delegating. Your team takes great notes, makes real commitments, and reverts to old patterns two weeks later when pressure hits.
Jim goes to the layer underneath. The belief systems formed decades ago that create blind spots now. The nervous system patterns that hijack decisions before conscious thought has a chance to intervene.
Audiences leave understanding why their current patterns exist, how to recognize when old programming takes over, and what actually changes behavior under real pressure.
Jim’s style is direct but disarming. He makes rooms full of executives laugh at themselves. He simplifies neuroscience without making it academic. He tells stories from his own corporate journey and from coaching 150+ leaders who’ve sat exactly where your audience is sitting.
Keynotes and Leadership Workshops
When Success Isn't Enough: The Leadership Reckoning No One Talks About
You've achieved everything you set out to accomplish. The title. The respect. The results. Somewhere along the way, it stopped feeling like enough. This keynote explores why high achievers often feel most lost at the peak. Jim unpacks the belief systems that drive achievement (prove your worth, control outcomes, never show weakness) and what happens when those patterns stop serving you.
The Adventure Within: When Conflict Is Helpful
Jim opens with a story about his grandfather catching him filling a tractor's radiator with diesel. Instead of telling Jim's dad, he grabbed a garden hose, floated the diesel out, and said, "Let's never tell your dad about this." He solved the problem but avoided the conversation. This keynote explores what happens when leaders choose false harmony over truth. How internal conflict leaks into teams, families, and entire organizations when left unresolved. And what becomes possible when leaders learn to use conflict as a tool for growth instead of something to manage around.
Legacy in the Dirt: Growing Stronger Farms by Growing Stronger Leaders
The strongest farms aren't built by the hardest workers. They're built by leaders who can hold the tension between honoring tradition and embracing necessary change. Jim brings deep agricultural fluency to leadership development. He addresses why conflict avoidance (deeply embedded in ag culture) creates the very problems you're trying to prevent. How to navigate family dynamics without losing your sanity. And why the leader you need to become requires unlearning some of what got you here.
Multi-Gen, Multi-Drama: Turning Family Farm Friction into Leadership Growth
The family business that's supposed to be your legacy is creating the most stress in your life. Mom and Dad won't let go. The next generation wants everything to change yesterday. Siblings have different visions. Jim tackles the patterns that create family business dysfunction: unclear decision rights, conflict avoidance masquerading as respect, and the identity confusion when "family" and "business" become impossible to separate. Practical frameworks for having the conversations everyone's been avoiding.
Keynotes and Workshop topics
For Corporate and Life Sciences Audiences:
Mojo, Margin, and Meaning: A New Framework for Sustainable High Performance
What Got You Here Will Burn You Out: Leadership Lessons from the Edge of Too Much
Be. Have. Do.: Rewiring the High-Achiever Operating System
Permission to Want More: Why Playing It Safe Is the Riskiest Move of All
Neutering the Inner Critic: Finding Clarity in a Loud, Approval-Addicted World
Fix the Drain Before You Burn Out: Energy Leaks & Leadership Freaks
For Agricultural Audiences:
Harvesting the Future: Navigating Family, Faith and the Farm without Losing Yourself
Escaping the Rat Race: How to Transition to a More Authentic Path of Leadership
Fences, Fields and the Future: Building Boundaries that Actually Grow the Business
Harnessing the Heat of Conflict: How to Use the Fire to Heat the House Rather than Burning Down the Barn
All keynotes can be customized to your organization's specific challenges, industry context, and leadership development goals.
What Leaders Are Saying
I’ve never heard a leadership lesson like that before. It was very reflective and definitely opened my eyes to what drives me.
Jim delivered the right content at the right time with exactly the right amount of insight and humor for our group.
Jim’s presentations were right on point for our organization as we go through upcoming change in the system.
I had the privilege of working for and with Jim when I took my first associate role at Eli Lilly. Jim taught me so many things about people and myself and what I wanted my own leadership to look like. He has a way to pair genuine care and candor. He’s a large part of what’s inspired me to lead the way I lead today.
Jim’s passion for developing leaders was abundantly clear in every interaction I had with him. The coaching and leadership tools I gained from my time with Jim helped ease my transition to Lilly and ultimately made me a better leader.
Jim has a way of making things come full circle. From childhood experiences to needs and values and how they impacted who we are and how we operate as adults. Definitely recommend him for your institution.
We are looking to change culture. Jim is a great speaker and I will be asking the CEO of our company to sponsor him.
I appreciated the special care Jim took to tailor his message to what was happening in our organization and tie in his message to that.
Jim has been a coach and friend through my career, and has been a tireless advocate helping me unlock what was hidden away inside. My career and my life are better for Jim’s mentorship and friendship.
Meet Jim Bishop
Jim grew up on a family farm in Indiana and graduated from Purdue University School of Agriculture. He spent 20+ years inside Fortune 500 life sciences companies, including Eli Lilly and Elanco, before founding Conjunction Leadership in 2019.
150+ senior leaders coached across 5,000+ hours. ICF certified. Featured in LA Weekly’s "Top 10 Leadership Coaches to Watch." Author of The Adventure Within.
Today, Jim still tends his family farm in Indiana, where he lives with his wife Nicole and their five children.
Event Planner Resources
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Contact: ji*@*******************ip.com