The Moment
A question I never expected to hear.
After nine years at Strategy, four President's Clubs, consistent performance, a career I was proud of, I moved countries and everything fell apart. The pipeline I'd spent years building didn't travel with me. I was starting from scratch in a new market, and it showed.
I remember the exact moment a former VP looked at me and asked if I still wanted my job as a Senior Account Executive. Not as a threat. As a genuine question. And the fact that it was genuine made it so much worse.
Here I was, a rep who had made President's Club four times, missing quota year after year and not understanding why. The skills hadn't gone anywhere. The work ethic hadn't changed. But the results weren't there.
The Struggle
Imposter syndrome doesn't care how long you've been doing this.
I'd never had to question myself before. I had always been the one with the answers, the rep who figured it out, who put the work in, who showed up. But now I was struggling with imposter syndrome in a way I hadn't known was possible after a decade of results.
How does a successful AE miss quota multiple years in a row? I couldn't make sense of it. I kept looking for an external answer, the market, the territory, the timing, when the real issue was something deeper that I hadn't yet found the tools to address.
"For too long, Account Executives have suffered in silence. Trying to get the job done and not realising they have one hand tied behind their back."
The honest truth is that I didn't know what I didn't know. And in sales, that gap is expensive.
The Turn
I decided to stop trying to figure it out alone.
I made a decision that changed everything: I sought external help. I turned to Ian Koniak and his program, Untap Your Sales Potential, and signed up for a full year of 1:1 coaching with Ian.
It wasn't an easy decision. As someone who had always prided themselves on being self-sufficient, on being the one who helped others, it felt uncomfortable to admit I needed help. But that discomfort was exactly what I needed to sit in.
What followed was one of the most significant years of growth in my career. Not just professionally, but personally too.
The Other Side
Calm. Clarity. And something I didn't expect.
After the coaching program (and I'm still involved in a group setting today) something shifted in how I move through the world. There was a sense of calm and clarity that hadn't been there before. Not confidence in the shallow, performative sense. Something quieter and more durable than that.
It showed up at work. It showed up at home. I became more present for my wife. More intentional about where I put my energy. The professional and personal were never really separate, and coaching helped me see that clearly for the first time.
"Not only did this positively help my professional life and how I show up to work, it also had benefits in my personal life and how I can be present in the moment."
Why I Coach
To give back to a community I've been part of for a decade.
I started Carried & Coached because I know what it feels like to be a capable rep who is quietly struggling and to not have anyone in your corner who truly understands the seat you're in.
Most managers are too stretched to coach properly. Most training programmes are built for the average, not for the individual. And most AEs are too proud or too tired to ask for help until things get bad enough that asking feels like failure.
I'm here to change that. Not with a course, not with a cohort, not with a playbook. Just private, focused, 1:1 work built around your deals, your gaps, and your career. The same kind of work that changed mine.
If any part of this story sounds familiar, the performance, the struggle, the quiet question of "why isn't this working?", I'd like to talk.