I have served as a personal and executive sounding board since 1983, as an international consultant since 1994, and as a business coach since 2000.
Mine has been a non-linear journey through life and career. I’ve been a bus driver and mechanic, a bartender, a provider of special needs services, an administrator, a marketer for start-ups and high-tech firms. Along the way I learned to dance, which made available parts of myself that had previously been unavailable.
Realizing that what I’d discovered for myself would be of use to others, I started to help some international business people step more fully into their leadership capabilities. In doing so, I would name the potential I could often see before they did, creating space for that potential to emerge, and for their star to become fully-formed. I incorporated dance, using it as a metaphor to look at what it takes to be effective both leading and following, and inspiring business leaders to take innovative steps through the challenges they face.
Having learned first-hand the value of having wise coaches, mentors, consultants, and/or partners on life’s journey, my greatest thrill has become helping leaders – especially those who had not recognized themselves as such – find and step into themselves. I am also energized by helping individuals and companies develop their distinctive gifts. It is this for which I founded Dancing Star International, through which I treasure the opportunity to work with uppity women, gutsy men, and up-and-coming young people, encouraging them to find their true voice and use it to make a difference in their world.
By applying intuition grounded in solid business experience, both mine and my colleagues’, I help individuals and organizations reach beyond the ordinary to embrace their talents and differences, so they achieve their highest potential as innovative leaders and teams. I have a range of business experience in fields such as education, transportation, publishing, high-tech, and the arts – much of it in start-ups, whether stand-alone or within a corporate structure. I have been an outplacement and career advisor, an international coach/consultant, and most recently an Operations VP, and I understand what it takes to bring change initiatives – personal, entrepreneurial, intrepreneurial, or start-up – to a place of functional (and financial) stability.
Having worked abroad for many years, I am also keenly aware of cultural biases and gaps, and am committed to helping bridge them. An avid traveler from an early age, I have worked with individuals and organizations large and small throughout Europe, the US, Canada, the Middle East, Asia, and South Africa.
I am known for asking direct questions that inspire people to think outside their “box”. I have a knack for seeing things others miss, often observing people and life from my own unique perspective, the naming of which opens up new possibilities. One of my key skills is simply listening – hearing underlying messages, then helping clients identify and move through associated block(s). Speaking from my own extensive experience of successes and failures – as well as from the models in which I have trained – my strength is an intuitive ability to see big-picture potential, energizing stakeholders to shift to a more robust, productive approach. I help them to tap resources they didn’t know they possessed, and to shine as the leaders they are capable of being. Because while most of my clients have already been successful in external terms, they have realized that there’s more, something missing that I help them identify.
I hold a BA cum laude in Comparative Literature (French and Spanish) from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst. I studied with The Institute for Creativity and the University of Surrey in the UK; I hold a PCC (Professional Coach Certification) from the International Coach Federation and a CPCC (Certified Professional CoActive Coach) from The Coaches Training Institute, with whom I also completed an intensive one-year CoActive Leadership training course. I have continued my professional (and personal) development, studying Leadership in the UK, REN coaching in China, The Bigger Game in the US (for which I am a certified trainer), The Inside Team in the US, and Shadow Coaching in Canada. I have continued to build my own initiatives, including my current project the International CEO Center, which has included members from China, Korea, Europe, Latin America, and the USA.