September has given me plenty to notice. In my work, conversations about next year are happening alongside decisions that need attention now. At home, our family is finding its way through several changes, including the arrival of a new grandson.
For this second edition of Notes from the In Between, I’m sharing what I’m working on, what I’m learning and a little of what life is asking of me along the way.
Looking ahead while delivering today
The client conversations I’m having this year have a different tone. Leaders are looking further ahead while facing pressure to grow organically, make sense of AI’s impact on their businesses, and bring their people through change.
What I’m noticing is how closely these decisions are connected. An investment in AI raises questions about roles and skills. A growth plan asks something of people who may already be stretched. Each choice has consequences beyond the budget or the quarter.
Long-term planning gives leaders a way to weigh those choices. It also requires honesty about what they don’t yet know and which assumptions they may need to revisit. As Q4 approaches, I’m interested in how teams make those judgments together.
That brings me back to what happens before the results. Can people question a priority or say that they don’t have the capacity to deliver? Do managers understand the decisions well enough to explain them? When everything is urgent, it becomes difficult to know where to put your attention.
How leaders approach these conversations matters. Acknowledging uncertainty gives people a more honest basis for their work. Making a clear choice about what can wait helps them act on what matters now. These are also moments in which future leaders learn what leadership looks like.
One question captures the tension I’m hearing:
How do we deliver this year’s commitments while funding the capabilities we’ll need next year?
Writing and exploring deeper questions
This month, my article, “Four Practices That Turn Leadership Alignment Into Team Momentum,” was published in Forbes Coaches Council.
It grew out of a leadership session where people came prepared to think together and work through difficult topics. The preparation mattered: Leaders clarified the purpose, participants contributed their thinking beforehand, and the group had time to hear perspectives that might otherwise have gone unspoken.
When a session goes well, I want to understand what helped. Looking closely at those choices gives a team something useful to carry into its next conversation.
I’m also designing my Think Tank session for the upcoming Fierce & Fearless Leadership Conference: Lead Fully: The Inner Conditions That Create Extraordinary Leadership.
I’ll be working with a small group of women leaders to explore a belief at the heart of my work: who you are is how you lead. We’ll look at the stories we tell ourselves and the moods we bring into our interactions, including what our pace and posture communicate before we speak.
One question I’m inviting participants to consider is:
Where have I been trying to change my actions instead of the conditions creating them?
We’ll use that reflection to consider a conversation, boundary or commitment they want to approach differently.
I’ve been a member of the Junior League since 1996, so when an opportunity comes to support women leaders in this organization, I’m quick to say yes! I’m now developing an Association of Junior Leagues International (AJLI) Training Collaborative session, Real Talk, Stronger Teams: How to Lead, Give Feedback, and Stay Friends.
What happens when the person you need to hold accountable is also your friend? It’s a familiar tension in volunteer leadership. We’ll work on establishing expectations early and giving and receiving feedback with care. I want participants to consider what they may be leaving unsaid to protect a friendship, and whether an honest conversation could strengthen it.
Also this month
Last month, I received my International Coaching Federation (ICF) Mentor Coach Specialization (MCS) for MCC coaches. This month, I added my Coaching Supervisor Specialization (CSS) and my MCS for PCC coaches.
I care deeply about the development of coaches. They need places to examine their work honestly, talk through difficult judgments and notice their own part in what happens with a client. Continuing my own development is part of the responsibility I feel to the coaches who trust me with that work. I ask them to stay open to learning, and I expect the same of myself.
I’m also honored that the International Association of Top Professionals (IAOTP) has selected me for its 2026 Female Trailblazer of the Year Award, recognizing my contributions to leadership advisory and coaching.
This recognition means a great deal because of the relationships behind it. I’m grateful to the clients willing to examine their own leadership and to the mentors, coaches and colleagues who have challenged and supported me over the years. Thank you to IAOTP for this honor.
And my new Igniting Success website is live! Putting my work into words has made me think carefully about what I want people to understand about how I serve leaders, teams and coaches. I’d love for you to take a look and tell me what resonates.
On the horizon
I’m deepening my involvement in David Drake’s Narrative 720° Project as part of a small founding group helping to shape the process and platform. David’s partnership with Acreue combines coaching with developmental agreements and reciprocal feedback. AI and data support the work, with the coach’s judgment and relationships central to the process.
We’ll test elements of the approach and contribute feedback as it develops. I’m excited to be a thought partner while there is still so much to explore, particularly how people turn assessment insights into commitments they can work on together.
I’ve also finished the next chapter of the book my co-author and I are writing, and I’ll be making more time for it in October.
Last month, I introduced the generative way, our exploration of leadership as something that emerges between people through the conditions they create and the conversations they enter. As we write, I want to stay close to how people experience this in their work. The book is still taking shape, and I’m learning to enjoy not knowing exactly where it will lead.
I’m also beginning Novalda’s nine-month Diploma in Team Coaching Supervision, led by Kerry Woodcock and Sherry Matheson. The program will deepen my work in supervision, with particular attention to the relationships and wider organizational dynamics involved in team coaching.
A team coach has a great deal to attend to, including their own influence on the team. I want to keep developing my ability to help coaches examine that complexity. I’m looking forward to learning with peers who will ask me to examine my own practice, too.
Worth sharing: Priya Parker’s books
I’m reading Priya Parker’s The Art of Gathering: How We Meet and Why It Matters for the third time. It remains a must-read for anyone who invites people into spaces for meaningful conversations.
Parker draws attention to choices we can easily overlook when we repeat a familiar agenda. Why are we gathering, and who needs to be part of the conversation? A specific purpose helps us decide how to use the time and what to ask of one another.
Her idea of generous authority is especially relevant to leadership. A host has a responsibility to guide the gathering, protect participation and address dynamics that interfere with its purpose. Even a simple agreement about how we’ll listen can help people step outside their usual patterns.
As I prepare for upcoming sessions, I’m asking:
What does this particular group of people need from this time together—and what am I willing to do differently to make that possible?
Up next is Parker’s newest book, The Art of Fighting: The Transforming Power of Conflict. Given the conversations I’m preparing to lead, I’m curious about what it will ask me to reconsider. You can find more of her work on her website.
Life in the in between
Last month, I shared some of our family’s transitions: a move here in Orlando, my daughter’s return to Richmond for a new opportunity, and my husband’s new role. And a week ago, we welcomed our new grandson! Mumsie and Chief now have two precious boys to love and spoil. Our hearts are full.
With so much changing, I’m thinking about how to move through it with grace when the overwhelm sets in. I can be grateful for all of it and still need a moment to catch my breath.
Some of what I ask leaders to consider applies at home too. How much can I reasonably take on? What expectations am I placing on myself and the people around me? I’m reminding myself to ask for help and allow others their own way of adjusting.
Some days, that means reconsidering what really needs to happen today. Other days, it means putting the list aside to enjoy holding a new little life. I want to leave room for that joy, even while there is plenty left to do.
A question I’m carrying forward
As we move into October, I’m carrying this question with me:
Where might a little more grace make room for what you’re navigating right now?
Perhaps giving ourselves that room allows us to see something we couldn’t see before.
Until next month,
Angela
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