I’ve lived many lives: investor, consultant, non-profit builder, writer, teacher, researcher.

What connects them is an abiding passion for big, intractable problems and the people who tackle them.

About my coaching

I coach leaders to do the inner work that unlocks hypergrowth. My clients are founders and executives of venture-backed technology startups. I also work with leaders in fields ranging from professional services, healthcare, non-profits, and others.

Topics that come up most often with clients include: accessing your superpowers, scaling your leadership, giving and receiving difficult feedback, managing emotional challenges at work, leading from empathy and compassion, and being a minority in the workplace.

Prospective clients who’re curious about how to get the most out of coaching can read my thoughts on the topic, and can get a real feel for what it’s like to be in session with me by listening to interviews (here and here) I’ve given about my approach to coaching.

  • I’m a Columbia-trained executive coach and have received over 300 hours of training in the Enneagram, Growth Edge, and Leadership Circle 360. But that only scratches the surface of what I bring to the table.

    It’s important to my clients that I’ve worn many hats before becoming a coach. I continue to be an active investor, advisor, and builder as well as a coach because it keeps me in the game and plugged in to your contexts and most pressing challenges.

  • I’m not a coach with a “10-step approach,” and I’m certainly not trying to sell you a prefabricated program built on nuggets of wisdom that have happened to work for me.

    While many of my clients may face similar challenges, I believe the real work of coaching involves me attuning to your specific reasons for “stuckness.”

  • I believe that what you can name, you can master. Unfortunately, too many founders and leaders suffer for lack of a richer vocabulary for describing what’s going on in their professional lives.

    I’ve spent the better half of a decade getting a doctorate in how narratives structure our mental and emotional experiences. Coaching is my commitment to getting a PhD in your narratives to help you own your story.

  • All my clients face real, practical problems they need to solve. Our coaching will enable that. But my approach in session is to slow way, way, down and help clients stop doing, thinking, and processing long enough to notice what’s happening inside them.

    My preferred verbs for coaching: “try,” “observe,” “reflect on,” “experiment,” and “notice.”

  • Coaching doesn’t begin and end with our hour-long sessions. In our time together, I help you cultivate a capacity for self-inquiry and reflection-in-action that continues to grow outside of our sessions.

    Coaching doesn’t begin or end with the duration of our engagement, either. Once I’ve been your coach, I’ll always be in your corner, rooting for you whether or not we remain in active coaching.

About me

In addition to my own coaching practice, my role as Partner and Coach-in-Residence at Avalanche VC sees me supporting founders transforming how people learn, earn, and own. In the spirit of that thesis, here’s my story:

Learn

I learned everything I know about how to learn from the 21 years I spent growing up in Singapore. I moved to the U.S. in 2006 to attend the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania, where I graduated with a BA and BS, followed by Stanford University, where I graduated with my MA and PhD. I haven’t stopped learning since. 

Earn

I’ve earned my stripes across a peripatetic career. Points of pride include: writing an award-winning dissertation at Stanford about what thinking feels like, building Minds Matter Bay Area’s curriculum and theory of change from scratch as Head of Instruction, and partnering with the largest health systems in the country to unlock top-line growth as an Associate Partner at McKinsey & Co.

Own

After over a decade of zigs and zags, I’ve come to own coaching as my life’s work. Helping leaders do their inner work takes many forms, prime of which is the 1:1 work I do with my own clients and our founders in Avalanche’s portfolio. In select cases, I also take on advisory roles in growth strategy and operations to set teams up for their ascent up the next S curve.