Meet the coach
Eliese Davis
Coach. Talent strategist. Business-minded practical optimist.
“I’ve spent my career studying what happens when people and work collide.”
For more than 25 years, I’ve worked inside organizations watching smart, capable people navigate pressure, politics, change, ambition, uncertainty, and each other.
I’ve built talent strategies. Developed leaders. Coached executives. Designed organizations. Led teams. Facilitated hard conversations. And sat across from a lot of very accomplished people trying to figure out what the hell to do next.
That experience taught me something:
People are the strategy.
Every strategy eventually depends on human beings being able and willing to execute it. How they lead, communicate, make decisions, handle conflict, respond to pressure, and understand themselves determines what happens next.
How the coaching works
Room to examine all of it.
I don’t believe you need someone else to give you the answers. Most of the people I work with already know more than they think they do.
But work gets noisy.
There are expectations. Politics. Competing priorities. Other people’s opinions. Your own assumptions. And sometimes the story you’ve been telling yourself for so long that you’ve stopped questioning whether it’s true.
Coaching creates room to examine all of that.
I listen closely, notice patterns, ask better questions, challenge you when it’s useful, and help you see what’s difficult to see when you’re standing in the middle of it.
Sometimes that feels validating.
Sometimes it feels uncomfortable.
Usually the interesting work involves a little of both.
The business side, too
The work has to survive the real world.
I understand the business side, too. My career has spanned talent management, leadership development, learning and development, talent acquisition, organizational design, and coaching.
That matters because leadership doesn’t happen in a vacuum.
You can have a fascinating insight about yourself on Tuesday and still have a difficult employee conversation, an executive meeting, a reorganization, a budget, and twelve competing priorities waiting for you on Wednesday.
The work has to survive contact with the real world.
That’s why my approach sits at the intersection of people and business. I pay attention to the human dynamics without losing sight of what the organization is actually trying to accomplish.
My coaching style
Curious, direct, and willing to go there.
My coaching is curious, direct, and challenging when necessary, while creating enough safety to explore things honestly.
I don’t tell people what to think.
I ask questions that help them see what they’re not seeing.
And I keep the work practical and business-grounded rather than theoretical. An insight only matters if it survives the meetings, decisions, and hard conversations waiting for you on Monday.
A little about me
Curious, questioning, and suspicious of coffee-mug advice.
I’m an ICF Professional Certified Coach (PCC), a member of ATD (the Association for Talent Development), and I hold an MBA in Finance. I also bring more than 25 years of experience working with people, teams, and organizations.
I read a lot. I ask a lot of questions. I believe self-awareness is one of the most underrated capabilities there is. I think emotional intelligence is frequently misunderstood. And I’m deeply suspicious of leadership advice that fits neatly on a coffee mug.
Outside of work, you’ll usually find me traveling, writing, reading, playing music, or spending time with the people and dogs I love.