ABOUT
“A meeting is a place where you practice your future together.”
– adrienne maree brown, author of Holding Change
WHAT I DO & WHY
Sometimes the bad inspires the good!
Early in my career, at a kickoff meeting for the redesign of a wastewater treatment plant, I learned how NOT to facilitate a meeting. About 30 engineering colleagues and 40 client team members, suffered through two excruciating days of meaningless visioning. We left the meeting feeling demoralized instead of uplifted. Such a waste of time and talent!
As a budding sustainability leader and facilitator, I vowed to design meetings to be productive, fun, efficient, and worth the investment of time and money. So, I gathered best facilitation practices, learned many group engagement techniques, and eventually made facilitation my profession.
FACILITATION MAKES A DIFFERENCE
I love my work, because it allows me to:
- Make a difference. In the big picture, I facilitate groups to have important conversations, and I train change-makers in soft skills because this work empowers other leaders and makes the world a better place.
- Lend a hand. When we work together, I take the stress out of planning and leading important meetings, workshops, crucial conversations, and team growth by lending my thoughtfulness, experience, and creativity.
- Feel joy. I feel such joy and fulfillment when groups in my care awaken their genius, understand each other better, make good decisions, and resolve their conflicts.
WHAT I BRING
As your facilitator, trainer, and thought partner, I bring:
- Expert facilitation, honed over 15 years with small and large groups, public and private meetings, in the US and abroad (India, Europe, South America).
- Fluency in technical areas, from my background as a former engineer and corporate leader in sustainable development.
- Solid project management, so all details are covered; no surprises!
- Familiarity with leading change in organizations and systems, and the associated challenges.
- Attention to detail, quality, and good communication.
Please reach out, if you’d like to explore working together.
MEET ME OUTSIDE WORK
I was born in Erie, Pennsylvania, and lived there until my family moved to the Philadelphia area when I was ten. Just outside the little town of Media, I grew up roaming the woods and fields and loving school.
My interest in rocks and land forms led to studying Geology and Civil Engineering in a combined Bachelor’s degree at Princeton University. At Virginia Tech, I earned my Master’s degree in Geotechnical Engineering.
I headed west after completing graduate school, taking a job in Portland, Oregon with a global engineering company CH2M HILL. There, I practiced as a professional engineer and led two corporate sustainability programs for ten years. Full of challenges, these years developed my leadership skills, commitment to clear communication, interest in facilitation, dedication to great project management, and understanding of systems change.
I now live in Seattle with my husband, an assortment of pets, and a garden.
The outdoors is my great release, whether hiking, horseback-riding, biking, or kayaking. As a voracious reader, my bookshelves hold professional references alongside folk stories, poems, novels, biographies, science writing, and lots of how-to books about horses, knitting, sewing, gardening, and cooking. Hobbies include painting silk scarves, cooking, and learning to play the Celtic harp. Adventure is in my blood, too: sailing to Bermuda with my dad, climbing Mt. Rainier, training for and winning a body-building competition one year.
SERVICES
