Founder & CEO | Human Capital Strategist
Yvon Golbach, CEO and founder of Zest for Work, is a leading expert on contemporary careers, sustainable performance, and the well-being of human capital in organisations. Her work helps leaders and organisations navigate the growing pressure, complexity, and pace of modern work through a more human-centred, science-based approach to resilience, change, and performance.
Yvon has a diverse professional background in chemistry, energy management and corporate wellness. She has spent over 10 years at Johnson & Johnson where she was responsible for Employee Health and Well-Being in EMEA. Yvon’s contribution impacted thousands of people, across 45+ countries, helping them increase energy & productivity while being happier and better versions of themselves.
Yvon’s biochemistry background inspired her to solve issues at its core. With a career in healthcare, Yvon was passionate about preventing illnesses instead of treating them, by focusing on understanding the conditions that make people sick. This led to the founding of Zest for Work in the Netherlands in 2017.
Through Zest for Work, Yvon partners with global organisations to help organisations and people navigate the growing pressure, complexity, and pace of modern work. Her work focuses on enabling sustainable performance through science-based programs designed to help people stay energised, productive and ever evolving in environments of continuous transformation.
Yvon is an international Master Trainer & Facilitator, ICF certified coach, leader in the field of sustainable career management and human energy. She works closely with the Academia and is the Dutch partner of TalentlogiQs®, a spin-off of the University of Antwerp, all of which have positioned her as the expert in enabling sustainable performance.
Her work bridges science and practice, translating research on resilience, nervous system regulation, behaviour change, sustainable careers, and workplace transformation into practical, human-centred solutions that create lasting impact.
Outside of work, Yvon lives in the woods near Eindhoven in the Netherlands with her partner Lars and their dog Mila. She enjoys climbing, mountaineering, and spending time in nature; experiences that deeply shape her perspective on resilience, recovery, growth, and sustainable performance.
Exploring how people and organisations sustain performance, resilience, and adaptability in increasingly complex and fast-changing work environments.
Exploring how cognitive overload, pressure, and constant connectivity influence focus, decision-making, adaptability, and performance at work.
Exploring why transformation efforts succeed or fail based on people’s capacity to adapt, adopt change, and perform under pressure.
Exploring how AI, workforce transformation, and shifting expectations are reshaping careers, employability, and long-term career sustainability.
Facilitated a tailored resilience programme for a regional CFO team within a large Fortune 500 company, leading a significant integration and acquisition. Focused on building emotional and mental resilience, the session helped this senior finance team strengthen their awareness of personal signs of energy depletion and overload at a high-pressure moment of organisational change. By making the experience both deeply personal and immediately applicable, the programme equipped leaders to navigate the demands of the M&A process with greater composure, clarity, and control.
Over the years, Yvon has build and facilitated a personal energy and resilient leadership programme, grounded in neuroscience, to over 100 leadership teams across Fortune 500 companies, helping senior leaders sustain their performance and build resilience through better energy management and intentional recovery. Built around practical, applicable tools, this leadership journey equips leaders to manage their minds and their energy, prioritise recovery, and lead with greater clarity, composure, and purpose. Beyond individual resilience, the programme enables leaders to role model the behaviours that sustain performance and energy across their organisations, embedding a culture that is present when it matters most, and that can adapt, focus, and perform sustainably from the top down.
Served as advisor to PwC Netherlands to pilot and establish a career development initiative built around sustainable careers. Through a tailored Career Competencies programme coupled with individual coaching, their senior directors reflected on their own careers and on how to craft careers that sustain personal motivation and energy. Beyond individual interventions, Yvon drew on her broad career-development expertise and connections with academia to support the strategic direction of PwC's approach, helping facilitate thinking at an organisational level about the conditions for mutual career success, including multiple Partner sessions and HR Think Tanks to strengthen the company's mindset toward a new vision for career development and talent management.
Host and speaker for Zest for Work’s webinar exploring the relationship between employee wellbeing, energy management, sustainable performance, and organisational effectiveness in today’s evolving world of work.
Speaker at the WeConnect International Conference, where Yvon delivered an interactive “Energy ” keynote exploring the role of human energy in performance, resilience building and connection. The session combined behavioural science with experiential learning to help audiences rethink how energy influences work and wellbeing.
Contributor and recurring guest host in the Dutch Noloc podcast series Specialist in Loopbanen, where Yvon joins expert conversations on AI, careers, human adaptability, and the changing world of work.
Recent episodes explore topics such as responsible AI adoption, AI literacy, career resilience, digital transformation, and the impact of technology on career guidance and workforce development.
Learn how the stress response works, how stress signals develop and why stress awareness is essential for resilience and performance.
Learn more