[Jamie]’d have me notice spaces on my body, and when I came out of it, she’d say, “What do you know?” And I’d just know. Every time. It’s like she bypasses the amygdala—my fight-or-flight center—and helps the rest of my brain take over. I slow down, find the solution, and then we talk strategy.

It’s not the kind of session people expect. It’s not “What should I do?” and the coach gives a plan. It’s more like, “Let’s get quiet so you can hear your own knowing.”

A client recently transitioned into a custom-made-for-her leadership role—with executive sponsorship and the team support of her dreams. And now? 🥶 She's frozen. In her words -- "overwhelmed by everything [she] could be doing."

The day I found out I was underpaid from reading an industry newsletter with salary benchmarks, it dawned on me like a gut punch: 

I DIDN’T KNOW HOW TO ADVOCATE FOR MYSELF.

You’re allowed to feel both proud and petrified. Brave and unsure.

You don’t have to resolve that tension. You get to be real inside it. That’s one of the most honest, human things you can do.

She reached out for coaching because, in her words, she didn't want to make the mistake of being "too blunt, too forward, too much" in her negotiation-- a critique she's heard more often than she'd care to count over her decades-long career. So here are four things we worked on in coaching.

😤 “She was dismissive of me in a meeting I led. She thinks she’s smarter than me,” a client vented today in a coaching session.

My client is a newly hired team lead, assigned a hiring budget and project mandate.

When I ask her why she needs the buy-in of the person who’d been dismissive, she says, “That’s how I’ll know I can do this.”

I'm a transplant from South Korea and a naturalized New Yorker for 19 years and counting.
A career and executive coach for women.
Someone learning to navigate the perimenopause journey.