​​Frequently Asked Questions

 

How did you become a coach?

I started out as a legal aid poverty law attorney in the 1990s. I had earlier earned a master’s degree in English literature, and while I worked for Vermont Legal Aid, I taught various courses at a couple of local colleges. When I decided to leave law practice, I started working full-time at Woodbury College as a program director. One administration role quickly led to another, and I eventually became the Dean of the College (chief academic officer).

 

Unfortunately, in 2008 Woodbury experienced an unrecoverable enrollment crisis. Its faculty and students were transferred to another institution in an acquisition that I helped negotiate, and my position was eliminated in the transition. Having worked with a superb executive coach for a few years and admiring her skills, I used my career pause to obtain the same Leadership Coaching Program credential she had received at Georgetown University’s Institute for Transformational Leadership. I loved it so much that I launched my own leadership and executive coaching business in 2009. My LinkedIn profile has more details, if you’re interested.

 

What is your approach to leadership coaching?

Leaders are now being asked to navigate significant changes in a global environment that is moving faster and less predictably than in previous eras. Good leadership means something quite different than it did just 5-10 years ago. All of our macro contexts – from the economic to the social, cultural, technological, and biospheric – are untethered from precise cause and effect. The exercise of leadership in such conditions requires counter-intuitive skill sets, which are really mindsets and heartsets.

 

These days, leading a family, team, or enterprise into the emerging future requires an emphasis on “being” at least as much as “doing.” This means proactively cultivating nervous-system regulation, emotional intelligence and human connection alongside traditional leadership competencies (e.g., effective communication, teamwork, strategizing and decision-making).

 

In my coaching practice, my clients and I take a holistic and organic approach to the inner work of increasing the potency of their individual presence in order to be more impactful in their outer action with people and systems.

 

Do you have an ideal client, or specialties?

I specialize in working with higher education administrators, nonprofit CEOs and — through my affiliation with American University's Key Leadership Institute — emerging leaders in several U.S. government agencies.

 

My wheelhouse is agents of transformation who are keen to explore how their whole life purpose aligns with their leadership journey. (If you're a curious person asking yourself questions like "Who am I becoming?" in the process of embodying your own leadership, I might be a great coach for you.) My portfolio is largely comprised of mid-career professionals – including many women, clients from other historically underrepresented groups, LGBTQ+ folks, and their allies – who value bringing human-centered philosophies to their leadership roles.

 

Do you do 360-degree evaluations?

Yes. I conduct developmental (as distinguished from performance-measuring) 360s in contexts where they are an investment in expanding a leader’s capacities for emotional intelligence, multiple perspective-taking, creativity, and systems awareness. I am certified in two instruments that are “deep” enough that they require confidentiality between the practitioner (me) and the participant (my client – no managers or bosses) in order to respect the participant’s vulnerability in the debriefing process. They are the Leadership Circle Profile™ and the Emotional and Social Competency Inventory (ESCI) 360° assessment.

 

I will also occasionally do an organic 360 evaluation using an interview process that I co-design with the client, where the purpose is the client’s retention, growth and flourishing.

 

What other leadership development services do you offer?

I enjoy designing and running six-month to year-long leadership programs; partnering with other trainers to deliver workshops and modules in professional development programs; and offering customized coaching and consulting experiences with teams. Facilitating workshops and interactive keynotes at conferences is a lot of fun for me, too. Themes that tend run throughout my range of services include a commitment to promoting cultures of engagement and belonging; practices for expanding courage, resilience and well-being; and the power of curiosity, humor and play in leadership.

 

How do you spend your time outside of work?

My life is pretty integrated; how I spend my time and energy outside of work often informs my leadership development practice in surprising ways. I read and write nonfiction by following my curiosity, visit art museums (my husband is an artist), and travel on a regular basis. My three favorite international trips in the last decade were to the Galapagos Islands for hiking and snorkeling, to Senegal to teach coaching skills to West African regional leaders at Catholic Relief Services, and to northern Japan for a walking tour in the footsteps of the 17th-c. haiku poet, Basho. Closer to home, my current interest is visiting sites of Indigenous dwellings and artifacts, especially in the Sonoran Desert. That said, I am often most relaxed when I’m at or on bodies of water (I’ve loved fishing since I was two years old), and other loves of mine include Zumba dance fitness, nature photography, poetry, the Boston Red Sox, and hanging with our rescue dog, Ella.