Dr. Christina Villarreal is a Silicon Valley-based executive coach with over 15 years of experience supporting tech founders and leadership teams through dynamic stages of company growth. With a unique blend of psychological expertise, strategic team-building skills, and executive leadership and resiliency training, she has helped guide a wide range of founders and their teams from concept to scaling, through navigating critical junctures of growth in capital raising, acquisitions, and IPOs.

Her coaching practice is rooted in empowering founders to hone their unique leadership styles from a strength based model, stabilizing and improving team dynamics, supporting diverse teams through high-stakes decisions with clarity and confidence. With an empathetic and pragmatic approach, Dr. Villarreal offers tailored guidance in high stages areas of decision-making such as renegotiating equity splits, managing investor relations, and developing sustainable growth strategies. She has a proven track record of helping teams align on vision, culture, and execution, leading to impactful results and successful outcomes.

Recognized for her work with top Silicon Valley founders, Dr. Villarreal is known for fostering resilient leadership and creating a supportive environment where teams thrive through both periods of rapid growth and challenging transitions. Whether navigating early fundraising rounds or preparing for an exit strategy, she is a trusted partner to founders seeking long-term success in the ever-evolving tech landscape.

Dr. Villarreal earned a Bachelor’s degree in Psychology from Emory University in Atlanta, Georgia, a Master’s Degree from the University of San Francisco in Counseling, and a Ph.D. in Clinical Health Psychology from The California School of Professional Psychology (CSPP) at Alliant International University, with specializations in Behavioral Medicine, Cognitive Neuroscience and Personality Assessment. She is trained as an Advanced Certified Personal and Executive Coach (ACPEC) through the College of Executive Coaching, focusing on leadership and corporate people management. She has conducted research through the Center for HIV and AIDS Prevention (CAPS) at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF), with scientific publications in the areas of sexual risk behavior as it relates to gender and cultural constructs. She teaches coursework in Personality Theory, Abnormal Psychology, Assessment of Diverse Populations (UC Berkeley), Conflict Resolution (Hult International Business School), and Personality Assessment, Cognitive Assessment and Health Psychology/Behavioral Medicine (Argosy University).

Dr. Villarreal currently provides executive coaching and leadership training for global organizations across the tech ecosystem, finance/venture and media industries.  She lives and works in the San Francisco Bay Area and Los Angeles, California. She has experience coaching C-suite/SVP/Director/senior manager leaders and teams from an extensive range of organizations, including Google, OpenAI, Anthropic, Pixar, Slack, Airbnb, Bluesky, Frog Design, Klaviyo, Kapor Capital, LinkedIn, Netflix, Instagram, Salesforce, Hubspot, Box, Bitso, Uber, ICONIQ Capital, Vertex Ventures, Pivotal Ventures, Felicis Ventures, Toast, ServiceNow, San Francisco Giants, Tomabravo, JLL Spark, a16z, Wonderschool, Certares, UiPath, BetMGM, Ro Health, Forethought.ai, Credit Karma, Willett Advisors, Fivestars, Peerspace, Y Combinator, AfroTech, Echoing Green, Camelback Ventures and Kauffman Fellows.

Dr. Villarreal’s past work has been featured in a variety of international publications and television news networks including The Wall Street Journal, Techcrunch.com, The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC), ABC, CBS, .Mic, KQED San Francisco, NPR, The Oxygen Channel, TD Jakes Show, The Lifetime Channel, Scholastic Scope Magazine, OWN, Topix Media Lab, and La Tercera, Chile’s national news publication.

Currently, Dr. Villarreal balances her professional time between executive leadership coaching and consultation, corporate training and psychology education and resides in both the San Francisco Bay Area and Los Angeles, California.