Eman Bataineh

My favourite clients are ones who are both humble and exceptional – impressive leaders who still want to learn and grow. I work with executive leaders to shape their team culture. I work with boards and executives who need help having difficult conversations. I work with learning leaders on creating organization-wide offerings. I work with individuals who are yearning for a change, for something to be borne of them at this time.

This past year I supported an executive team and their new private equity owners to have a difficult conversation about the business’s performance and come up with a plan and commitment for turning it around. To do this, I interviewed each executive team member and the new owners. I compiled these interviews into a wholistic perspective on what I heard that I could play back to them all. I designed a customized workshop that allowed them to share what was really painful – lack of safety, layoffs, endlessly moving and seemingly impossible targets – and afterwards they built a sense of togetherness and worked through their strategy together in the room. We paused every now and then to notice what was and wasn’t working and apply leadership and teaming concepts to the work. It was practical, it was real, and it was human. And I loved hearing them say at the end, “We never thought we could get here.” I loved witnessing them remember how much they are capable of, especially together.

I start with listening to what clients want and then playback what I heard, checking for gaps. Then, I craft a possibility of what we can do together and test it out with them. Throughout the process, I am already coaching, so we have a sense of what it’s like to work together. In the room/session, I ground and structure what we do using the safety of boundaries and a clear direction. From there, we flow through what emerges. Throughout our work, I attend to the practical – I take notes, invite specificity, and ask direct questions to ensure clarity. At the same time, I harness the potential for transformation – I do spot coaching on particular behaviours, I invite participants to name what’s under the surface, I create constellations and invite participants to use their bodies’ intelligence. After an engagement, I follow up, summarize what we learned, and identify what we can do going forward.

I am “classically” trained in leadership as a former management consultant specializing in leadership, and I learned how to hold space from some really exceptional facilitators of personal transformation. I am shaped by my life experience growing up and living in diverse cultures. I am shaped by my travel and being in nature. I am shaped by my own quest for growth and my curiosity about being human – body, mind, spirit. I am shaped by my children, by being a parent, and by experiencing others tend to and care for their loved ones.

I am a certified leadership development facilitator and coach with over 17 years of global experience. Earlier in my career, I served as Chief Operating Officer of McKinsey Leadership Development, the firm’s leadership practice.

I hold certifications in facilitation (Harvard Kennedy School’s Leadership for the 21st Century, Corporate Evolution’s Facilitating Transformation Through Values, McKinsey’s Advanced

I am walking under the forest canopy. I am a mother giving everything I can to my children and trying to enjoy the time I have with them. I am a faltering Danish speaker working to grow roots and community in a new home. I am brewing kombucha and listening to podcasts while tending to the endless small and big things of family life.