Can you tell us more about how you started working with senior leaders and government agencies as a coach and consultant? For many years I was working in the Northern Virginia area (near Washington, DC) as a parttime yoga teacher and full time mom. Over time, students started asking to work with me one-on-one, and my private practice grew. I later studied the practices of coaching and yoga therapy, so that I could become more qualified to do this type of tailored and customized work. I also pursued a PhD in health communication, to learn more about how I could engage more compassionately with my clients and promote yoga and lifestyle medicine more effectively. In 2012, a big moment happened when a woman came up to me after a keynote talk I had delivered. She told me she was with the Washington Post and that she wanted to write a feature on my work bringing yoga into office settings. That article ended up going viral, and I started getting calls from organizations and leaders globally who wanted to learn more about my methodology. Since then, it has been an honor and privilege to work with so many government agencies and organizations in the public and private sectors – especially during the pandemic and since then. Even after all of these years of developing well-being solutions, I am still honored to do this work. Over time I have started calling it co-creation, instead of customization, because for me it’s really about partnering with the client. What makes you so passionate about sharing the benefits of yoga, lifestyle medicine and coaching? In my own life, yoga has helped me to know myself well, and empowered me to show up more authentically and unapologetically as the real me – not the me that others expect me to be. Lifestyle medicine has equipped me with the energy and stamina I need to handle the stresses I feel every day – in my struggles and in my successes. Coaching has empowered me to show up more fully for myself; for my family; and for the people I lead. Each of these disciplines have changed my life, and the trajectory of my life story – and I have seen them do the same for the leaders I coach and the organizations I consult. You call your YogaMedCo method of coaching evidence-informed, not evidence-based. Can you explain what you mean by this? Evidence-based practices are those that we know from research actually work; some kind of scientific inquiry has validated their performance and/or their potential. Evidenceinformed practices are those that integrate evidence-based practices, with real-world professional expertise and the real life lived experience of the client or group. Through evidence-informed practice, we get to see how research, real life, and lessons from the real world of practice do and don’t line up. At that intersection is a solution for a client that is informed by the best of all three of them – one that is both data-driven and doable. Can you tell us more about your commitment commitment to social impact? I think it is important for each of us to do what we can, and to support the causes we believe in. A few years ago, when our company was smaller than it is today, the National Board of Health and Wellness Coaching put out a request for donations to support their campaign to promote the profession to the “payers” (insurance companies). I believe that health coaching can make a big impact on the healthcare ecosystem, by helping patients to process the challenges of their healthcare journey and to engage in healthier behaviors – thereby reducing burdens across the system. So I decided to make a leading gift (as the highest Finance Monthly Global Awards 2023. USA 15
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