Case Studies

Executive & Leadership Coaching

A variety of senior leadership coaching journeys with outcomes.

Adaptive Leadership and Relationship Building in Tech

A senior leader at a renowned tech company faced the daunting task of adapting to a new role, managing strategic projects, and temporarily leading a second team. With goals of onboarding successfully within 90 days, building key relationships, and setting clear coaching goals for accountability, the complexity of her challenges was evident.

Engaging Jamie for her proven expertise in leadership coaching, the leader sought to navigate these challenges by focusing on strategic onboarding, adaptive leadership, and effective relationship building. Jamie’s coaching provided a pathway to harness her strengths and rich experience towards realizing these goals, embracing the new role’s uncertainties with confidence and a deep understanding of the organizational culture.
In partnership, they explored the client’s goals, allowing her to transition from simply “occupying the role” to recognizing that “My insights are pertinent and can actively contribute value.” This shift was facilitated by Jamie’s guided thinking and actionable steps, translating discussions into proactive commitments and reflections on the outcomes as learning opportunities. This approach enabled the client to refine her strategies continually, adapting to her evolving role.
Within six months, the client was not only successfully integrated into the company culture but also publicly acknowledged for her leadership impact.
Over the first six months, the coaching engagement’s impact was profound. The client successfully integrated into the company culture, led her teams effectively, and built strong relationships across the organization. Her leadership was publicly acknowledged, especially her positive impact on a recent acquisition, showcasing her success.

From Pigeon-Holed to the C-Suite

Julia was a high-achieving manager who felt pigeon-holed in an area of the organization that had low visibility. Whenever she approached her boss about career path development, she received little to no direction.

We started looking at how she could be more visible with other decision makers. She had a mentor with whom she met once a month and decided to ask her mentor what volunteer opportunities might be available to contribute to and show her value.

Within six months, Julia was further promoted to the executive team with expanded responsibility.

The mentor immediately mentioned an opening in a role that had a direct line to the executive team of the organization. Julia applied for and got the job. She was then able to demonstrate her visioning, planning and leadership skills.

From “Perfect” to Authentic – Developing a Leader’s Confidence, Relationship Building, and Engagement Skills

Chris was a senior level leader in his organization who excelled in his role. Despite a confident exterior he was plagued by imposter syndrome and often questioned himself. He also had a specific area for development, empathy.

As Chris identified and focused on his values, demonstrated and led by those values, and had positive results – rather than thinking he needed to be somebody other than himself – his imposter syndrome subsided, and his empathy skills increased.

Within a year, Chris was promoted to global leadership in his area of the business.

Through our coaching, Chris was able to build closer relationships with more people, be more relatable when presenting, coaching, and mentoring others, and share more about his philosophy and values. People were able to see Chris as a human rather than a boss who “had it all together” and who seemed unapproachable.

Shifting from Tactical to Strategic

Joseph was an expert at achieving sales that were consistently far above expectations. He was quickly promoted and at mid-life was a leader of leaders. However, he was still operating at a tactical level, getting into the weeds with the sales team members and not growing his direct report leaders to the degree that would allow him to be more strategic.

In order to progress in his career, which he very much wanted, Joseph needed to get out of the tactical and focus on strategy. He had received this feedback from his leader. Through examining what was at play, we were able to find a way for him to fulfill his strengths and values in new ways. Instead of getting overly involved when he was worried a deal was at stake, he groomed his direct reports to be the leaders that he needed them to be and who they wanted to be. This allowed him to trust that they would handle what he would no longer be involved with and for him to apply his strengths and values to focus on the bigger picture and create a vision, strategy and plan.

We were able to find a way for Joseph to fulfill his strengths and values in new ways.

As a result, Joseph was promoted to the next level in his area, promoted one of his direct report leaders to fill his prior position, and now leads both his prior team and two related teams.

Positive Impact Leadership

A sample of the return on positive impact leadership coaching.

From Fear-Based to Flourishing

Susan came to coaching, fearful to address passive-aggressive behaviours in her organization. She knew that I worked with organizations and created desired organizational culture, and she reached out to me for help.

We started with her, building her courage, her ability to address these situations, and taking the necessary and brave steps to turn the situation around. We looked at her values and how she could live in integrity with those values for herself and as a leader. She was able to model the way.

She also learned to be clear, to delegate more, to release much of what she was doing to be more creative and innovative. This required her to clarify roles, delegate for growth and development, and provide ongoing balanced feedback to support psychological safety and self-efficacy of her team.

As a result, stability was created. This leader’s time and energy were freed up to be much more creative and strategic. She had many ideas which required input and engagement of her team as well as external stakeholders and clients which we continue to build out and implement.

Values-Based Organizational Culture Leadership

A taste of what focusing on values-based organizational culture can accomplish.

From Turbulent to Thriving

From turbulent to thriving: Spark Success was approached by an organization that had an executive team that was experiencing a turbulent transition. The leader approached me for executive/leadership coaching. Through our coaching, the leader navigated the transition and established a solid team built on trust and set the organization up on a solid footing. The leader then brought me in to coach her with the executive as a team.

Next, we worked towards creating a values-based organizational culture with team members of the entire organization. This amplified trust and increased engagement and collaboration. Subsequently, I conducted research there to amplify client engagement. From the research analysis, recommendations, and action plan, we have implemented new initiatives. Engagement has indeed amplified, the organization has become even more collaborative, and their client base has grown. Each new initiative is based on systems thinking, appreciative inquiry and values-alignment to create a relevant, thriving, growth-oriented environment with sustained momentum.

They now have a thriving, solutions-oriented community that is highly aligned with their organizational values. Some of the positive changes include increased innovation with multiple new initiatives generated through increased time and energy and improved collaboration and teamwork, productivity due to collaboration and teamwork, an increase in client volume and satisfaction, and an organizational culture score of 81 in an industry where the average is 51 to name a few.