You lead in a mission-driven space.
Executive directors, chiefs of staff, senior leaders in nonprofits, social impact orgs, and purpose-led companies. I know this terrain — the constraints are real, and so is the possibility.
Hi, I’m Athena —
a coach for people who are becoming
something they don’t
quite have words for yet.
I sit with leaders in the in-between — the offer not yet accepted, the role half-grown into, the version of yourself that’s asking to be let out. Coaching with me is quieter and more honest than most things on your calendar. That’s the point.
Write me a few lines
or scroll on — there’s no hurry.
A few honest facts:
Trained at Hudson Institute
Credentialed by the ICF
Coaching from Bellevue, WA
Retreats & facilitation
Twenty years leading the kind of work I now coach — across nonprofits, global organizations, and startups. One conviction underneath all of it: people grow when they’re actually listened to.
— Athena, on a Tuesday
A short version, while you’re here:
I came to coaching the long way.
I grew up Chinese American, raised to put my head down, work hard, and not take up too much space. I was good at the rules — Stanford, management consulting, a career that looked right on paper. And then I got laid off in 2008, packed up, and went to work with a grassroots nonprofit in India. That was the first time I stopped following someone else’s script and started trusting my own.
What followed was anything but linear — a tech startup, education nonprofits, the Gates Foundation, Teach For All, and eventually City Year Seattle, where I served as Chief of Staff, then Managing Director of People, Strategy & Operations, then Interim Co-Executive Director. The work I loved most across all of it was the work closest to people: helping leaders find their footing inside hard seasons, building cultures where folks could actually bring themselves to work.
Coaching is where I get to sit beside leaders inside that exact territory.
I trained at the Hudson Institute of Coaching and hold my Associate Certified Coach (ACC) credential through the ICF. I’ve coached with the Women’s Impact Alliance and Coaches for Causes, supporting leaders — especially women and BIPOC leaders — doing work that matters.
My style is warm, direct, and quietly relentless. I’ll listen for the thing underneath what you said. I’ll ask the question you’ve been walking around. And I won’t be in a rush.
A few quiet promises —
What I’ll do every time
we sit down together.
- ·1
I listen for what isn’t said
Most coaching breakthroughs live inside a sentence the client almost finished. I track tone, hesitation, the patterns underneath the story you’ve been telling yourself.
- ·2
I start with what’s working
We don’t grow by hammering at what’s broken. We grow by getting fluent in what’s already alive in you — then using that fluency to face the harder edges with steadier ground.
- ·3
I hold values and outcomes together
Performance without alignment burns leaders out. We track both: what you’re actually moving in your work, and how aligned that motion feels with who you want to be.
- ·4
I keep the next step small
Every session ends with something real and right-sized — a conversation to hold, a boundary to test, a permission to grant yourself this week. Insight without practice is theatre.
The work isn’t becoming someone new. It’s becoming a little more honest with the person you’ve been all along.
Ways we might work together —
Five shapes the work tends to take.
Every engagement starts with a free, no-pressure call. We’ll talk about what you’re inside of, and whether coaching with me is the right next step — or whether I should point you toward someone better suited.
A real coaching partnership for leaders inside a real season — an elevation, a transition, a scope that’s outgrown the old version of you. Twelve 60-minute sessions, async between, a midpoint to recalibrate, a quiet closing.
- A first session to find the shape of the work
- Stakeholder interviews if useful
- Async support between sessions
- Midpoint review
Sometimes you don’t need six months, you need this month. An offer to weigh, a hard conversation on the horizon, a season of burnout to step out of. Six focused sessions, scoped tight to the question in front of you.
- Tight outcome scoping
- Six 60-minute sessions
- Decision and narrative work
- Energy and boundary practice
Working with intact executive and senior teams on the dynamics that quietly cost the most — trust, conflict, decision rights, the conversations no one is having yet. Designed in partnership with the team’s leader.
- Team diagnostic and 1:1s
- Off-site or recurring sessions
- Decision and accountability design
- Individual coaching add-ons
Designed for individuals or small groups at a crossroads — a leadership transition, a strategic inflection, or simply the kind of exhaustion that needs more than a long weekend. Held in intentional spaces, away from the ordinary.
- Pre-retreat intake and design
- Facilitated solo and group time
- Somatic and reflective practices woven in
- Integration support after
For leadership teams who need to think together — not just report to each other. Whether you’re setting direction, navigating a transition, or surfacing what’s gone unsaid, I design and hold the container so the right conversation can happen.
- Pre-work and stakeholder listening
- Custom session design
- Live facilitation and synthesis
- Follow-through planning
People who tend to find their way here —
Leaders in the middle of something real.
I don’t coach by archetype, I coach the human in front of me. But the leaders who land here usually share something underneath. See if you recognize any of these.
You’re learning to trust yourself as a leader.
Women and BIPOC leaders navigating spaces that weren’t always built with them in mind — finding their voice, building authority on their own terms, and letting go of the version of success they inherited.
You’re in the middle of a real transition.
A new role, a reorg, a promotion you’re not sure you want, a season of burnout that’s asking something of you. Coaching gives the moment the room it deserves.
You’re renegotiating what success means.
You’ve followed the script long enough to know it isn’t yours. You want to lead in a way that actually fits — that includes ambition and values, performance and wholeness.
If none of those quite fit but the door looks like the right one, write me anyway. We’ll figure it out together.
A few things people have said —
Quietly, with permission.
Working with Athena was really great in helping me better understand myself and the mental blocks preventing me from achieving my full potential. She was a great listener and helped me gain a new perspective.
“I left with increased confidence and communication skills. Athena is extremely kind, personable, and encouraging, and helped me see through my assumptions and negative frameworks.”
“Athena knows how to ask probing questions that helped me understand why I feel a certain way and encouraged me to have a different thought process that is more beneficial to my growth.”
Quotes shared with permission and lightly edited for length. Names held back — every engagement begins with confidentiality.
The road in —
The work behind the work I do now.
A coaching bio is usually a list of credentials. Mine matter — and so do the years I spent actually leading. Both are why I can sit with what you’re carrying.
- Now
Coaching, in my own practice
Working with individual leaders, leadership teams, and mission-driven organizations — nonprofits, social impact orgs, tech, and beyond.
- 2023–24
Hudson Institute of Coaching
Trained in leadership development and change. Associate Certified Coach (ACC) through the International Coaching Federation.
- Alongside
Women’s Impact Alliance · Coaches for Causes
Coaching women and BIPOC leaders working toward equity and social change.
- 2017–24
City Year Seattle / King County
Seven years: Chief of Staff, then Managing Director of People, Strategy & Operations, then Interim Co-Executive Director. Led the organization through growth, transition, and equity integration.
- 2013–17
Teach For All
Chief of Staff to the Executive Management Team at a global education nonprofit — strategy, board governance, and organizational change across a network spanning 50+ countries.
- Earlier
Monitor Group · Gates Foundation · Yola · Digital StudyHall
Management consulting, a grassroots NGO in India, a tech startup, and education fellowships. A non-linear path I wouldn’t trade — it’s where I learned to trust the dots I couldn’t connect yet.
- The start
Stanford University
B.A. in Psychology, M.S. in Management Science & Engineering. Two lenses I still bring to every conversation — the inner life, and the systems people live inside.
We start with a free 30-minute call. If it feels right on both sides, we agree on an engagement — most start at six months, twice-monthly. Sessions are 60 minutes and confidential. Between them, I’m available for short async check-ins to support what you’re putting into practice.
No. Therapy tends to focus on healing and patterns from the past. Coaching is forward-leaning — your present circumstances, the futures you’re weighing, the practices that close the gap. I’m not a therapist, and I’ll say so clearly when something might be better held by one.
Most of my clients are senior leaders, executives, or founders — but the line that matters more is whether you’re in a moment that asks something real of you. If you’re carrying weight you want to grow into, you’re probably in the right place.
I’m based in Bellevue, WA and meet clients worldwide over Zoom. In-person sessions in the greater Seattle area are available by arrangement. Team off-sites can be hosted wherever you are.
Often, yes — executive coaching is a standard professional development line item. I’ll happily provide an engagement letter and outcomes summary to support that conversation. Some clients pay privately to keep the work fully their own. Both work.
Engagements are scoped to the work. I’ll share specific pricing on our first call, once I know what you’re actually navigating and what would genuinely be useful.
If you’re still here —
Write me a few lines.
Tell me what you’re inside of right now. Doesn’t need to be polished. A paragraph is plenty. I read every note that comes in and reply within a couple of business days — from me, not from a form.
— Athena