I’ve enjoyed a diverse leadership career traversing 25 years within a global tech company learning the many facets of Leadership while working in a wide variety of functional business leadership roles across finance, operations, marketing, product development, manufacturing, supply chain, and services, running P&L businesses, even dabbling in mergers & acquisitions.
A maverick, easily bored, I spent at most two years in a single role, before looking for the next! A common thread was building a truly awesome team that did amazing things together. Despite not having a HR role, I was in the human capital business.
Untethered from the corporate mothership, I spread my wings to launch my Leadership Coaching business 6 years ago. My entrepreneurial adventure began, I discovered and utilized my true gifts, one of which being to inspire and catalyze innovative, “out of the box” thinking in others to courageously pursue and realize their personal and professional dreams. Along the way, I discovered my Core Purpose: to serve, through coaching, entrepreneurs and founders leading for-profit businesses to consciously and intentionally use their businesses to make the lives of people and our planet better.
My middle-class, hard-working, loving family upbringing instilled strong values that served me well. Believing that I could change the world, upon my college graduation job search, I viewed large corporations as selfish, largely driven by generating profits. In contrast, the mid-market sector seemed more vibrant and innovative with hard-working entrepreneurs, like my parents.
Surprisingly post-college, I landed a summer internship with a large corporate tech company. I discovered that things are not always what they seem. Within corporate, I found many diverse opportunities available: functionally, culturally, and geographically across many different customer segments. My corporate journey entailed an exciting, adventurous string of 16 roles over 25 years.
My drive to make an Impact is a calling. Now, together with my dear friend and business coach partner, we’ve built a company that provides Impact Coaching services to entrepreneurs across the globe. Our coaching guides them along their scaling up journey to consciously grow and transform themselves, their teams, their communities, and our planet! I feel honored to work in Human Services, making an impact every day! That’s part of the reason I love this poem by Dave Hingsburger:
Paid to be Human
Being in human services is cool because…
In essence, you’re paid to be human.
Paid to explore the commonalities of the human condition,
Paid to discover the incredible diversity of the human spirit,
Paid to spend your day doing something that matters,
That makes a difference, something that you can be proud of.
Done right, you’ve chosen both a job and a passion,
Both a passion and a mission,
Both a mission and a purpose.
There are those who spend their lives looking for purpose.
You will rise to it each morning,
And that’s a hell of a way to start the day.
How can you be paid to be more human?
Lisa Foulger is a recovered Corporate Executive living in Central America now serving through coaching leaders globally to make the lives of people, our communities and the world a better place! Her company is GOL Global.