“Wherever we are, countless gifts of joy and wonder are offered to us every day—and we need to be present enough to notice and accept them.”
Maria Fafard is an executive coach and facilitator who is passionate about helping leaders reach their full potential. Drawing on more than 20 years of experience in technology, finance and consulting, including Fortune 100 experience, Maria coaches executives and high potential emerging leaders. She specializes in transformational coaching, helping clients to discern their core values and reorient their life and career around them, to uncover blind spots and to find new perspectives.
Maria sees coaching as a powerful tool to transform leaders, teams and organizations, and she works with leaders to co-create a reality of fulfillment, meaning and growth for themselves and the people they lead. Typical engagements with Maria address executive development in the areas of self-awareness; servant leadership; executive presence; mindfulness; collaboration and communication skills; developing an inspiring vision; articulating an authentic personal brand; and building relationships.
Maria quickly develops rapport with leaders and their teams. Clients find it easy to talk to Maria and quickly trust her to explore the most challenging roadblocks to effective leadership and joy at work. Maria knows to ask just the right questions and brings a welcome lightness to solving complex leadership paradoxes.
Experience
Maria successfully coaches leaders at all levels of organizations, including Fortune 100. Her portfolio of clients has included C-suite executives, vice presidents, senior directors and directors. She delivers coaching in enterprise-wide cohort-based leadership development programs for high potentials at a Fortune 100 company. Survey results: 100% of participants recommend Maria as a coach to other leaders. An accomplished speaker, Maria is known for her engaging presentation style, maintaining high energy and having a sense of humor. She frequently speaks at major conferences and events for organizations such as the Project Management Institute, Agile Alliance and Scrum Alliance (with audiences of up to over 1,600). Popular topics include Power of Coaching, Power of Virtual Meeting Facilitation, Personal Branding for Leaders, Spiritual Tools for Leaders and Coach Your Team to Greatness! More than 15 years of training experience. Designs and delivers coaching, facilitation, leadership and communications courses and teambuilding workshops as well as team coaching. Extensive experience delivering training in the tech industry and for federal clients. Delivered successful workshops across the U.S. and abroad.
Education, Training and Certifications
- M.A., Economics, The Catholic University of America
- B.A., Economics, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem
- ICF Professional Certified Coach (PCC)
- Certified Leadership Coach (Georgetown University Leadership Coaching program)
Assessment Certifications
Certified Professional Facilitator (CPF); Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) Steps I and II; EQ-i 2.0 and EQ 360; The Leadership Circle Profile; Developing Leadership Maturity (DLM) certification; Personalysis; and ICAgile Certified Professional in Agile Coaching and Team Facilitation (ICP-ACC and -ATF)