I'm executive coach Muriel Wilkins and this is coaching real leaders.

I've spent over 20 years working with highly successful leaders who've hit a bump in the road.

My job is to help them get over that bump so they can lead with a little more ease.

I typically work with clients over the course of several months, but on this show, we have

a one-time coaching meeting focusing on a specific leadership challenge they're facing.

Today, I'm coaching someone will call Elizabeth to protect her confidentiality.

I've always been very competitive, so I'll start there because I think that probably will

frame the rest of the conversation. I'm like a kind of person who's always wanting the next

big thing, and like, I don't need a carrot, but I need a goal to go for,

you know? Elizabeth left her previous role because she felt like she'd hit a bit of a ceiling.

She's now a marketing leader who's been at her current organization for a few years and was

recently promoted to her first senior executive role. From the beginning, I saw a lot of growth

potential. I'm a person who really

that's a core value of mine is growth. And so when I become stagnant or when I feel like I'm

hitting a ceiling, it's not good. Things do not go well. So yeah, I saw that opportunity. I

sensed that this is a company that has a lot of potential for growth,

therefore I would have a lot of potential for growth and development.

And it's turned out to be true so far until very recently.

I started the coaching conversation with Elizabeth by getting a better sense of how her

new leadership role is going and to hear why she wants coaching at this moment.

I think a couple of things are kind of happening in tandem. We're really at kind of an intersection.

I like to call us a teenage company because that's kind of how we operate.

...