What is a Modern Day Alchemist?

al·che·my

/ˈalkəmē/

noun: alchemy

  1. the medieval forerunner of chemistry, based on the supposed transformation of matter. It was concerned particularly with attempts to convert base metals into gold or to find a universal elixir.

  2. a seemingly magical process of transformation, creation, or combination.

What's different about me?

There are plenty of executive coaches out there who focus on your weaknesses, who try to "toughen you up" or recreate you in their image of executive presence, and who convince you that your problems are "out there" for you to vanquish relentlessly.

Eventually you realize you're Don Quixote battling windmills, with that coach as your faithful Sancho.  Each new problem is simply a symptom of the fact that the real challenges live inside yourself.  You must meet them with reflection, vulnerability, and courage.

 

You don't need a Sancho.  You need an Alchemist.

 

I'm a different kind of coach.

 

Over the years, clients have called me different things—their mindset coach, executive coach, leadership coach, or transformation coach. Each label captured part of what we do together, but not the whole picture.  Then I noticed something: those four aspects form natural steps in the journey: Mindset, Executive, Leadership, Transformation, and spell the word MELT.

 

You might say I help you MELT into yourself, revealing the GOLD inside: Growth-Oriented Leadership Development.

Because here's the thing about alchemy: the alchemists of old transformed base metals into gold. I'm a Modern Day Alchemist.  I help you transform your mettle into GOLD.

 

Leadership from the inside, out.

My Hero's Journey

The expected stuff

I have over 3 decades of experience in coach-approach leadership through personnel management, project & portfolio management, and process alignment across multiple types of organizations.  My career spans consulting and direct employment with start-ups, small businesses, government, and Fortune 20 companies.

Throughout these experiences, I've focused on helping individuals leverage their unique skills through significant improvements in their personal understanding and productivity.   I've helped organizations of all sizes improve their bottom line while strengthening their relationships with personnel and customers via culture design, process improvement, and strategy alignment.

I support individuals and organizations in attaining alignment between their purpose and their actions through education and coaching.  I help individuals in roles as diverse as Solopreneur to Chief Executive achieve more and multiply their impact in work, charity, and life.

In addition to founding Multiply Your Impact, LLC, I currently teach other coaches and coach-approach leaders at the CoachVille Center for Coaching Mastery.

Training

A lifelong learner, I hold professional certifications including Master Certified Coach (MCC) from the International Coaching Federation, HBDI Practitioner from Herrmann International, Higher Ground Leadership® Pathfinder from The Secretan Center, and Lumina Spark Practitioner from Lumina Learning.

I focused my Masters of Business Administration (MBA) thesis on Learning Organizations despite the formal classwork focus of Technology Management, and have been applying my diverse knowledge and experience to organizations and individuals ever since. 

 

The fun (and deeper) stuff

I've always been a helper.  The stories about my youth echo this theme repeatedly.  And this theme has been consistent throughout my career.  Today I recognize my purpose is to help others recognize and share the best of themselves, as I pursue that same goal for myself.

 

Not a Manifesto - "Soy Yo"

Rather, it's daily guidance - alchemical equations for designing my life with intention:

I live a healthy, vibrant, and fulfilling life where experiences with family, friends, and my thriving and impactful coaching business abound.

  • Sacredly Simple and Straightforward.
  • True Colors Shining Through.

  • Aspirationally Aligned Bias for Action.

Growing

I love a good puzzle, and putting disparate ideas together is a challenge in which I frequently find myself happily engaged.  As my career has evolved, I find the skills I've honed in looking at things differently, creating unique results from unrelated but common inputs, and experimenting to find unexpected paths to goal realization has been a fantastic byproduct of my natural curiosity and drive to find better ways.

It is a great joy of my life that I am continuing to do these things and more, in service of others through coaching.  Along the way I gain more knowledge and experience, and that growth propels me forward.

Recharging

Always challenging people to bring a spirit of play into their environments, I play while supporting charities with my bicycle — including century bicycle rides (100 miles) and antics like executing 10 daily workouts on a bicycle trainer sequentially in one day (earning my KoS!).

Lately I'm trying new team sports, like Bocce and Volleyball.

And if FC Barcelona is playing, I'm loudly cheering them as near to the field as I can get.

"A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step"
And that first step is outside of your comfort zone.
Let's talk about what that journey can look like for you.

Alchemist: Someone Who Transforms Things for the Better

Today we recognize alchemy as a pseudoscience, and give chemistry its rightful place as a serious scientific field, but the two terms initially overlapped in meaning before separating by the 17th century, just as astrology and astronomy did during the same period.

Alchemy and alchemist are in fact older words than chemistry and chemist in English. Alchemists believed that lead could be “perfected” into gold, that diseases could be cured, and that life could be prolonged through transmutation, or a change of some essential element into a superior form. Their secretive experiments, usually involving heat and the mixing of liquids, led to the development of pharmacology and the rise of modern chemistry.

The long route to English for alchemist began with the Greek word chēmeia, which probably came from the word chyma (“fluid”), derived from the verb chein, meaning “to pour.” It then passed to Arabic, which added its definite article al- (“the”) to the Greek root. The word then passed from Latin to French before coming to English. Some other words derived from Arabic also retain the al- in English, such as algebra, algorithm, and alcohol; in fact, the transformative liquid that was constantly being sought through experimentation by alchemists is another word with the Arabic al- prefix: elixir.

This power to transform things for the better, real or imagined, led to figurative meanings for alchemy and alchemist.

(Source: https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/alchemy#note-1)

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