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Executive Coaching for High Growth Founders, Leaders and Teams

 

Building a high growth company is both exhilarating and scary. It helps to have a guide.

 
 

Leading a growth stage company is hard. You're hiring like crazy. Your old systems and processes are breaking. You have less visibility into what everyone is doing day-to-day. Conflict and confusion are more frequent.

As a leader you are stretched. Your team is stretched. All normal at this stage. All painful. Trust me, I know. I've been in your shoes.

If you’re a founder or a senior leader in a growth stage company, then you know what I’m talking about. And I’m glad you’re here. I’m Glenn, former founder/CEO turned coach. My work is all about helping leaders like you successfully navigate these challenges.

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I help with the tricky company-level “x’s and o’s” at this stage: leadership development with measurable ROI, capital structure, building an engaged culture, creating a high-performing executive team.

I also help you as an individual leader address your blind spots and gaps. I help you develop new mindsets and skills to address the rising challenges you are experiencing. As the result of our work, you'll grow as a leader and as a person.

I've been where you are in the companies I've founded and led (read more below), and I know how meaningful it is to have someone in your corner who helps you solve pressing challenges. And who pushes you to grow.

If you’re a leader looking for support from a trusted guide and collaborator, I’d love to meet you. >> Let’s connect.

“Get the People Right. Get the Culture Right.”
— Ray Dailio, Bridgewater Associates
 

Leaders I’ve Worked With

 
We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used to create them.
— Albert Einstein

My Own Journey as a Founder

My coaching focus and approach is deeply informed by my own story. My career has had a few distinct chapters, including several founder and executive stints. I have founded three companies out of my garage/spare bedroom, scaled one into a national provider to major brands with a national footprint, executed a turnaround for a 2nd generation family held business. I’ve lived and pivoted through nearly every possible growth stage challenge.

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My own case study: My 1st founder stint was in the Dot Com era. I had a great career running a family business as CEO but my ambition had me focused on bigger things: building and running my own company. So I assembled a team, built a business model, outlined a GoTo Market, and raised a Series A. All boxes checked. I closed the Series A ten days before 9/11/2001.

Turns out, our little team was woefully undercapitalized as the market collapsed, and I was ill-prepared to steer us through the fallout. I made a litany of mistakes: poor choices driven mostly by fear; personal guarantees on bank loans and shareholder agreements; horrific co-founder dynamics. I made so many decisions out of fear and taking my own counsel. Bad idea.

In the end, the company didn’t make it. Even worse, neither did my marriage and my relationship with my two sons. Devastated, alone, broke and in debt (both emotionally and financially), I paid the price of my drive and ambition: the loss of what was truly important to me, particularly my relationship with my sons.

I learned the hard way. I didn’t know what I didn’t know. I tried to fix my problems alone and using the same thinking that created them. In retrospect (as most of these insights are), I would have loved to have a guide to avoid some of the pitfalls and fear-based mistakes (I couldn’t see they were fear based at the time to be sure). If you could use support in your current role as founder or leader, drop me a note.

Leadership Team Offsites

I frequently work with founders and their teams is facilitating offsite events with their teams. Each event is designed to improve team engagement and collaboration in key goals the team is struggling to achieve. Building team collaboration, trust, alignment and improving interpersonal dynamics norms as well as mapping behavior and skills toward strategic planning metrics are common goals. I have worked with Series A and Series B high growth startup founders and their leadership team to improve their team dynamics more effectively in one and two day events in San Francisco, Portland and New York City in the past 12 months.

 

Who do you work with? . . .

I work with founders, senior leaders, and their leadership teams in high growth companies. My clients face increasingly complex challenges as their companies scale, and often exhibit:

○ Difficulty with emotional regulation and fear around next steps
○ Lack of clarity or strategy about the next phase and how to prioritize for the greatest impact
○ Lack of clarity on what isn't working
○ Attachment to old ways of working that may be insufficient

What services do you offer? . . .

1:1 EXECUTIVE COACHING
I offer one-on-one coaching for growth stage founders/leaders/CEOs. I limit my 1:1 practice to 12 coaching partner clients at any one time with a high degree of “touch” and interaction designed into our coaching engagement during this challenging period. Learn More

EXECUTIVE LEADERSHIP GROUP COACHING (2-3 clients per year)
I offer group coaching to help teams build high-performance cultures through an extended arc of leadership development, group, and individual coaching. We establish metrics for work that ensure we measure ROI and impact. Learn More

What does your typical engagement look like? . . .

○ For my 1:1 Coaching: I offer 6-month and 12-month engagements depending on the complexity of your goals. We typically discuss your goals during our initial "fit' call to better understand your specific challenges and objectives. We meet three out of four weeks each month in a designated time slot reserved for you. I also engage with clients between sessions via Slack, phone or email. We meet via Zoom, Google Meet or MS Teams.
○ For Group Coaching: I customize each engagement based on our initial diagnostic with your team and your goals for team improvement and growth. Every scope is different and customized for each client and the existing challenges.

How much does your coaching cost? . . .

○ My monthly fees for 1:1 coaching begin at $2,500 per month. My group coaching services are priced based on an initial assessment and scope of services provided.

Am I a good fit? You are likely a good fit, if you are... . . .

○ Willing to work through any short-term emotional or psychic discomfort that could arise in your growth
○ Willing to challenge deeply “held” beliefs and assumptions about self, as well as other "legacy" beliefs about your company and team
○ Committed to the process and will put in the time to do the work
○ Willing to be more curious about life in a different way
○ Open to explore new forms of learning and testing of assumptions in a creative and thoughtful approach
○ Willing to bring your full playful, real, honest self to the table