In my work as a career and executive coach, I work with women of all ages, sizes and styles, and one theme has become very apparent: women are incredibly tough on themselves, full of self-rejection, shame, humiliation and doubt, particularly about their looks, their weight, intelligence and their worthiness.
I can count on one hand the number of women I’ve spoken with recently who feel “just great” abou...
Thousands of professionals are stuck in unhappy careers because they have a misguided belief that if they start exploring a new career, they’ll lose everything that matters to them. They worry that they’ll risk losing hard-earned money, status, title, flexibility, their place in their field because of years of experience, and more. It’s fear of loss and of giving up the “security” of their curr...
This month, I was honored to be interviewed for an Oprah Magazine piece by Celia Fernandez on It’s Time To Stop Saying I’m Sorry and how it hurts your confidence to say you’re sorry when you’re not. It got me thinking in greater depth about the crushing habit I see in myself and in so many other women I’ve worked with of saying they are sorry when they are actually feeling something very diffe...
Last month, I had the great honor of speaking at the Pennsylvania Conference for Women, an inspiring conference that attracts over 10,000 attendees from around the world. I gave two presentations, one on Finding Brave To Reach Your Highest Potential, for a breakfast event sponsored by Accenture for 150 senior women in pharma, biotech and medical technology. And the other was a panel discussion exploring the topic of Get Uns...
In the past 13 years of coaching and training professional women around the globe, I’ve seen firsthand that thousands of women have spent years building careers they thought would make them happy, only to wake up and realize they are very far from where they want to be, without a clue as to what’s in the way.
Thousands are expending great amounts of energy hiding the fact that they’re scared, sad and de...
I spent 18 years in corporate life, and experienced some great successes that I’m proud of. But I also faced some dismal failures. The failures weren’t around outcomes I generated, or projects I launched – those tended to go well. The failures centered around my emotional and physical well-being, how I was treated, and the lack of integrity, meaning and purpose I felt doing work that wasn’t aligned w...
Throughout my life, I’ve experienced times when things were truly falling apart (or so it seemed), and nothing I did improved it or turned it around. One of those times was at the end of corporate life 17 years ago. I was chronically ill for four years (with a serious infection of my trachea), depressed and exhausted, dealing with narcissistic bosses and toxic leaders, as well as sexual harassment and discrimination,...
Working with mid- to high-level professionals who long to create something dramatically better in their lives and careers, a stunning realization often emerges. Many see that they haven’t been true to themselves or honored who they are deep down. They begin to recognize that their authentic, core self has been denied in order to to feel accepted and validated in their job(s) and work cultures. Oftentimes, they realize...
As many around the world have now seen or heard, Senator Kamala Harris, Democrat of California, was interrupted for the second time in a week by her male colleagues, and called “hysterical” for behavior that is clearly, undeniably not hysterical but forceful and assertive.
As one who coaches and trains hundreds of mid- to senior-level professional women every year, I can assure you that this is not an isolate...
In my work as a trainer for new coaches, we focus on helping them refine their niche, and play bigger and stronger within that niche. I’m passionate about this because it took me far too many years (and a lot of wasted money and opportunities) to finally brave up and put a stake in the ground as to what I was keenly passionate to do as a coach. Why did it take forever? Because I was deeply afraid that the more narrow...