Redshift Leadership coach, Arzhang Kamarei, has been 100X what I expected and more. I’ve had great coaches before but nothing like this. I literally feel like I have a leg up on everyone around me given all the tools I’ve received. Couldn’t have found a better coach.
Describing Redshift as skilled at their craft is an understatement. What’s exceptional about Suzanne, Lizza and Redshift, and what truly sets them apart, is their ability to take very complicated notions (like culture or organizational change) or seeming simple ones (like how we treat each other, how we listen, how we take feedback) and turn them into practical, humane and inspiring ways to work. Their talents sound deceivingly simple, but anyone who’s done this work knows it’s anything but that. They can quote a scholarly article or introduce a methodology with a dash of practicality and humor, in ways you feel they fundamentally “get you”. They go deep – taking the time to get to know the people, quirks and talents of the organization they’re working with. What’s so powerful to see is that they somehow manage to find the pain points, tap into the strengths of your team and you leave inspired to be better leaders, ready to tackle the world.
Lizza of Redshift, may be the most effective consultant I have ever worked with. She took a deep dive into my section at The Humane Society of the United States, and familiarized herself with the whole organization to sleuth out what Redshift could best do to support us as we moved towards a healthier, happier workplace culture. Lizza cares deeply and invests in each person she works with. Members of my staff commented to me how they felt comfortable and trusted her with the individual and group sessions she did. I received many notes of appreciation from my staff after her workshop on “Cultivating a Culture of Emotional Intelligence, Positivity & Resilience,” as well as requests for more workshops with her. I am looking forward to her continued engagement with HSUS!
Redshift is able to help people understand emotional intelligence so that they see how important it is to the business and directly to the bottom line. We have many channels at our company, and each culture is very different. Suzanne can move in and out of the creative world or the strategic services side quickly and effectively. The practical wisdom she provides is spot on and done with total authenticity and humor. Recently, we had a group that really needed support around stability and positivity. Within 5 or 10 minutes of Suzanne talking with one of our senior creative teams, they were all ears, just soaking it in—they didn’t even want to go on break. What she has to say is so meaningful and powerful. That experience was literally transformative for the team. And it has stuck. People continuously refer to things Suzanne shared or said. She has such a unique style that I have seen transform even very reluctant groups and individuals. I can’t say enough. Suzanne is very approachable. She’s an excellent listener. And she does all of this with a great sense of humor. I think the authenticity of connection that she’s able to establish with groups and individuals is a huge part of her effectiveness, because people truly trust her. She listens deeply, she doesn’t push her agenda, and figures out what will be most effective for whatever group she’s working with. The wisdom she provide is so practical, we put it into action immediately.
Suzanne and her team have been exceptional partners in creating a wide variety of development programs, ranging from presentation skills to leading with emotional intelligence, from coaching to facilitating senior leader programs. Suzanne is spectacular to work with. With a wonderful sense of humor, warmth, and extensive knowledge and experience, she seamlessly connects with everyone from senior executives to staff of all levels and backgrounds in a multi-faceted global organization.
I’ve worked for 20+ years in city government and I’ve worked with a number of different consultants over the years, and so my standards and expectations are very high. It’s my belief that a consultant should make your life easier (otherwise you would just do the work internally). Redshift goes so far beyond making your life easier, they make your life so much better. I NEVER worry about what they’re going to deliver or how they will work with the teams, and I know that every dollar we spend is a worthwhile investment because we get so much back in return. It’s definitely the work that we should be doing, the investment helps with everything you’re trying to do. By the time consultants finish their work, I’m usually ready for them to leave. When Redshift is finished I’m always craving for them to come back. It’s so rare to find people that can come from the outside into a community and really care about the town and people and the organizations. They are fully invested in the work that they do. There’s this essence about them, they just get it, they get people.
Redshift Leadership has been a tremendous investment. Lizza is the complete partner, thoughtful, resourceful, innovative and focused on my success. She’s helped me draw on my strengths and experiences and has connected me with resources that were spot on. Her insight has been instrumental in helping me focus and prioritize. Her partnership has been exactly what I needed.
Emotional Intelligence, Positivity and Resilience are these big generic topics and what Redshift does so well is make the content accessible and meaningful for people. They give people a clear understanding of the brain science behind it all and backs that up with practical application. People love how Suzanne connects; she can connect with everyone whether it’s a group of 3 or a group of 200. Her sessions really feel like personal conversations. I love bringing her back as a facilitator. People often want to attend her sessions multiple times, saying that there’s always something new to get out of it. Having concrete tools and application adds a dimension that makes the learning real for people. We brought Suzanne in to do work with our HR team during a time of dynamic change. She worked with our leadership team that was guiding the change, and then came back to work with the entire HR team. No matter the audience, she is there for the group. I see her practice what she preachers in emotional intelligence by meeting groups where they are and empowering them to stretch to new places. She empowers us to do the work. She does an excellent job constantly monitoring who’s in the room and what’s needed. She may come in with a program, but she’s so aware of what’s going on for people in the moment and can shift seamlessly to where it’s most valuable for the group to go. In an organization this size, I would not hesitate to recommend Suzanne to work with any of our departments. She can naturally bridge across experience, responsibility levels and areas of expertise, and that’s really valuable.
Suzanne is our team coach. I was introduced to Suzanne when my usually high-performing team was uncharacteristically stuck and stressed. She helped pull us out of our funk and reframe the cloud of frustration into positive thinking that has become a continuing theme for our department and has made positivity our team’s brand. With Suzanne’s support, my team really tries to focus and be present for everything we do. As the Business Affairs and Legal staff, we’re forging a path to encourage better listening and more joy at work through mindfulness. And it’s contagious! After hearing about the work we’ve done with Suzanne, many other leaders across the company have expressed interest in achieving similar results for their teams.
Lizza proved to be an extraordinary keynote speaker and facilitator for The New England Regional Medical Group Management Association’s 2016 annual conference. She possesses a magical ability to establish rapport and captivate both the individual and large crowds of people. Our goal was to provide relevant leadership education that was pertinent to our diverse membership. Lizza uses her personal style to convey the lessons of 21st century leadership by example and in functional, easily applicable chunks. Our expectations were greatly exceeded.
After several decades of meaningful progressive impact in the healthcare arena, the passage of the Affordable Care Act led us to revisit our strategic priorities and organizational focus. Lizza and the Redshift Leadership team expertly supported us to be intentional about how we work together as a senior team and how we create a culture that supports our staff to work and feel their best. Redshift’s methods of diving deep into the organization to uncover what was helping and hindering our continued success uncovered areas of work that unlocked old patterns and energized new possibilities.
I could not possibly recommend Redshift Leadership higher to any organization who wants to be more effective, build an internal culture based on respect, and create an atmosphere where employees flourish in their roles. I was a bit skeptical about working with consultants, but my mind was quickly changed. Lizza Robb not only knows her stuff, she actually cares on a deeper level than I would have expected. Our success was her success, and after only a few weeks she felt like a member of our team. I’m looking forward to working with her and Redshift hopefully for the rest of my career.
We were merging several teams under one umbrella and there was a real opportunity to get alignment and clarity—to get clear on where we needed to go and pain points that we needed to heal. We knew we needed to do it right. Sometimes consultants come into organizations and churn it like a storm coming through—Redshift was like the sunshine that came in and helped us move through the storm to the other side. There is a rare authenticity to Lizza and Suzanne—their ability to understand the many different dynamics in our organization, their curiosity to get to the heart of things. They roll up their sleeves and really work with us as partners. Lizza as a facilitator has an incredible ability to establish rapport with multiple stakeholders. People feel incredibly comfortable opening up and revealing a lot to her very quickly. She is able to disarm the skeptics with her authenticity and openness and pure love for her work. What’s interesting about Lizza is that, while you know she has a lot of different clients, you feel like you’re the only one. She is absolutely present with you in the moment. Lizza skillfully helps you uncover the path that you need take, and she helps you get there by really listening to you and working with you. Lizza puts people at ease and has a unique way of also making them feel inspired—that they can do it. This work can make people feel uncomfortable (vulnerable) in a way that you don’t expect, but it’s okay because Lizza makes you feel so comfortable. There is complete ease in her approach. It takes a lot of courage for a team to do work like this, but the reward is invaluable. You learn so much about yourself and your organization. How to bring out the best in other people. Redshift supported the leaders to recognize and acknowledge the emotions that are part of these complexities but still help the leaders make hard decisions with integrity and grace and compassion. It’s hard to lead through the hard times but Redshift somehow makes it manageable and even fun. We are a much stronger team because of the work we did with Redshift Leadership. It has allowed us to have open dialogue about things we couldn’t talk about before. It allowed us to say to our division, “We heard you and here is what we’re working on—what we’re going to tackle in our journey. Redshift created a roadmap for us that helped people open up and address important issues like trust, safety, and finding meaning in the work you’re doing. They mapped out how we were going to address what came out of the organizational assessment and how to pace ourselves to make the changes we wanted to make and address the challenges together as team. We’re now moving together in one direction as a team instead of moving in 100 different directions as before.
What I really wanted to focus on in executive coaching was figuring out my personal passion and how that can drive the impact that I hope to have through my work. As with many nonprofits, my focus had always been on the organization’s needs. Suzanne helped me understand that when I orient around what really motivates me personally there are exponential outcomes for me and for the organization. She has supported me in choosing carefully how I want to focus my energies. My work with her showed me that it truly benefits my work to understand what lights me up—it makes me a better and more passionate ambassador for those areas. Suzanne is a great listener. She asks amazing questions. She’s incredibly insightful and gets to the heart of things quickly. Our work together has empowered me to own my position and power and understand that I get to have a voice and choose how I focus my energies. I think Suzanne is an excellent combination of someone who is clearly really successful and professional and also very in touch with what personally motivates and impacts people–a great balance of the heart and the head coming together to support executives. I feel so grateful to have been able to work with her.
After several decades of meaningful progressive impact in the healthcare arena, the passage of the Affordable Care Act led us to revisit our strategic priorities and organizational focus. Lizza and the Redshift Leadership team expertly supported us to be intentional about how we work together as a senior team and how we create a culture that supports our staff to work and feel their best. Redshift’s methods of diving deep into the organization to uncover what was helping and hindering our continued success uncovered areas of work that unlocked old patterns and energized new possibilities.
I could not possibly recommend Redshift Leadership higher to any organization who wants to be more effective, build an internal culture based on respect, and create an atmosphere where employees flourish in their roles. I was a bit skeptical about working with consultants, but my mind was quickly changed. Lizza Robb not only knows her stuff, she actually cares on a deeper level than I would have expected. Our success was her success, and after only a few weeks she felt like a member of our team. I’m looking forward to working with her and Redshift hopefully for the rest of my career.
We were merging several teams under one umbrella and there was a real opportunity to get alignment and clarity—to get clear on where we needed to go and pain points that we needed to heal. We knew we needed to do it right. Sometimes consultants come into organizations and churn it like a storm coming through—Redshift was like the sunshine that came in and helped us move through the storm to the other side. There is a rare authenticity to Lizza and Suzanne—their ability to understand the many different dynamics in our organization, their curiosity to get to the heart of things. They roll up their sleeves and really work with us as partners. Lizza as a facilitator has an incredible ability to establish rapport with multiple stakeholders. People feel incredibly comfortable opening up and revealing a lot to her very quickly. She is able to disarm the skeptics with her authenticity and openness and pure love for her work. What’s interesting about Lizza is that, while you know she has a lot of different clients, you feel like you’re the only one. She is absolutely present with you in the moment. Lizza skillfully helps you uncover the path that you need take, and she helps you get there by really listening to you and working with you. Lizza puts people at ease and has a unique way of also making them feel inspired—that they can do it. This work can make people feel uncomfortable (vulnerable) in a way that you don’t expect, but it’s okay because Lizza makes you feel so comfortable. There is complete ease in her approach. It takes a lot of courage for a team to do work like this, but the reward is invaluable. You learn so much about yourself and your organization. How to bring out the best in other people. Redshift supported the leaders to recognize and acknowledge the emotions that are part of these complexities but still help the leaders make hard decisions with integrity and grace and compassion. It’s hard to lead through the hard times but Redshift somehow makes it manageable and even fun. We are a much stronger team because of the work we did with Redshift Leadership. It has allowed us to have open dialogue about things we couldn’t talk about before. It allowed us to say to our division, “We heard you and here is what we’re working on—what we’re going to tackle in our journey. Redshift created a roadmap for us that helped people open up and address important issues like trust, safety, and finding meaning in the work you’re doing. They mapped out how we were going to address what came out of the organizational assessment and how to pace ourselves to make the changes we wanted to make and address the challenges together as team. We’re now moving together in one direction as a team instead of moving in 100 different directions as before.
What I really wanted to focus on in executive coaching was figuring out my personal passion and how that can drive the impact that I hope to have through my work. As with many nonprofits, my focus had always been on the organization’s needs. Suzanne helped me understand that when I orient around what really motivates me personally there are exponential outcomes for me and for the organization. She has supported me in choosing carefully how I want to focus my energies. My work with her showed me that it truly benefits my work to understand what lights me up—it makes me a better and more passionate ambassador for those areas. Suzanne is a great listener. She asks amazing questions. She’s incredibly insightful and gets to the heart of things quickly. Our work together has empowered me to own my position and power and understand that I get to have a voice and choose how I focus my energies. I think Suzanne is an excellent combination of someone who is clearly really successful and professional and also very in touch with what personally motivates and impacts people–a great balance of the heart and the head coming together to support executives. I feel so grateful to have been able to work with her.
Redshift Leadership, in particular Suzanne, Cortney and Lizza, became trusted advisors who added tremendous value, not only as outside-eyes looking objectively at workflow and processes, but also as expert organizational development resources who were accessible to my whole team. The Redshift team helped to facilitate open communications, participation and engagement. Making use of their expertise freed myself and other key members to be participants rather than caught between roles of facilitation, leading, and group member. They also helped with conflict resolution impartially analyzing points raised by the team. The Cycle of Change was an excellent framework to anticipate levels of resistance and plan ahead for our responses; it helped sensitize the leadership team to monitor for indicators of resistance and take proactive measures before it became counteractive. It gave the leadership team a common language to use when discussing the greater departments reactions. The leadership team and staff all have spoken with greater courage and respect when sharing concerns. We used the ESCI 360 instrument as a team development tool; my entire leadership team completed the survey receiving individualized feedback and used the team profile report as a means to contextualize our feedback in our group membership. Suzanne and Lizza provided individualized coach feedback sessions to help each person find meaning, focus on and leveraging strengths, and develop greater self-awareness.
We partner with Redshift Leadership to supplement our internal Leadership Development staff as we undergo tremendous change and growth as an organization, and we rely on Lizza Robb at Redshift for two principle reasons: First, Lizza approaches her work from a highly customizable perspective. She works in concert with us, builds on our most deeply held cultural values, and brings new levels of awareness to our business. Second, when Lizza works with people they are fundamentally moved. There is a seismic shift in people as they begin to see the world through a lens that is productive and hopeful, because Lizza sees their courage and confidence and their ability to make change happen.
After facilitating a business-wide brand audit, it felt important to engage my own team in the same kind of deep introspection. By conducting powerful interviews with department staff, stakeholders and external vendors, Redshift’s cohesive team created a safe space for us to get really honest about our strengths and our areas for continued growth. They shared a comprehensive report of findings with our staff and facilitated conversations in which we identified what needed to be addressed immediately and in the short- and long-term. It was an incredibly vulnerable process, but if you’re going to ask the hard questions, you have to be willing to hear the answers. We put our trust in the Redshift Leadership team, and that trust made the process a success.
Redshift has done many months of work with us supporting us to create the right work environment for change and growth. When they first started, the organization had camps between groups. People were at war internally, instead of with the competition. Suzanne came in and ran a two-day offsite with us, it was incredible and created actionable ways people could take ownership of impacting our work environment positively. With Suzanne, we identified the root causes and the destructive habits that had formed as a result. The process made the issues seem manageable. The way Suzanne talked about the work really motivated people personally to change the way they did things. After the offsite, I saw a marked improvement in the types of conversations people were having; I saw people having healthy discussions about even hard things and begin to bring up issues in a productive way. Throughout the many months of team and individual coaching, Suzanne empowered people to change their habits and therefore their outcomes. I have seen the culture change to one of positivity and honesty–an honesty that isn’t brutal, but kind and empathetic, which was just what the business needed.
Lizza and the Redshift Leadership team have become our vital partners in constructing a more effective, productive and happier workplace. Working intensively with our staff, they have given us personalized, creative, and thoughtful guidance to amplify our strengths and address our challenges. They deliver their guidance with a sure hand and a warm touch.