With clients from
"Intelligence is the ability to adapt to change."
—Stephen Hawking
Hi! I'm Mike Friedmann.
I'm a management scientist, organizational psychologist and certified executive coach and I'm here because I love helping executives, managers, and teams function more healthfully and more productively.
With past experience at Harvard Business School, IBM, and Columbia University's Department of Organization & Leadership, I’ve worked with some 300 clients, including:
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CEOs, fund managers, proprietary traders, venture capitalists, investment bankers, attorneys, management consultants, software engineers, and founders
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Professionals from Bain & Co., Citigroup, Esteé Lauder, Goldman Sachs, Google, General Motors, Leo Burnett, Johnson & Johnson.
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MBA students from Harvard, Yale, Columbia, NYU (Stern), Penn (Wharton), Cornell (Johnson), Oxford (Saïd), UVA (Darden), Georgetown (McDonough), and some 40 others across the U.S. and Europe.
My practice areas include:
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One-on-One Coaching for Executives — including topics like motivation; getting the team in sync; mission & values; feedback and communication; approaching difficult conversations; negotiation; and conflict resolution
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Team Coaching — including topics like team dynamics; mission alignment; getting in sync; BART (boundaries, authority, roles, and tasks); and transitions
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Workshops & Talks — including retreats, group facilitations, lectures, and other educational interventions on topics including organizational culture, motivation, task and team organization, team dynamics, social/emotional IQ, and conflict resolution
*Please note: I am not a clinical psychologist or mental health professional of any kind. Therefore, I do not diagnose or treat mental illness, trauma, substance use, personality disorders or learning disabilities.
"Problems are potential improvements screaming at you."
—Ray Dalio, Fund Manager, Founder of Bridgewater Associates
What does coaching look like?
Drawing on my background in management consulting and social psychology, I support clients with a variety of needs, including:
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Leadership — Including organizational culture; mission; managing objectives; motivation and team alignment; listening, feedback, and communication; social and emotional IQ; negotiation; and conflict resolution
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Goal & Strategy Management — Clarifying what's important and setting strategic goals—complete with milestones, metrics, timetables, and accountability meetings
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Personal/High-Potential Development—Help clients clarify their personal values and career purpose; develop their skills in self-leadership, strategic thinking, self-awareness, communication, productivity, and influence. Help clients set direction for their education and careers (common for MBA and university students).
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Work Habits & Organization—Develop clients' skills in organization, attention, time-management, and stress-management
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Career Development—Help clients: (a) match their skills, work values, and interests to jobs in the market; (b) network and job-search effectively; (c) write resumes and cover letters that translate into interviews; (d) communicate tangible value to hiring managers; (e) negotiate and close offers, (f) transition skillfully into new roles
My Core Coaching Values
Supporting your goals — Above all, I'm here to support you and the goals that you decide you want to achieve.
Radical honesty — I believe that you deserve radical candor, so I'm going to call balls and strikes as I see them, with your own development in mind.
Non-judgment — While I may provide feedback on what I'm seeing, I'm never here to judge you. Instead I'm here to support your goals while challenging you to grow.
Leading from behind — This is an expression we use at Columbia University to refer to the coaching relationship, wherein the client sets the direction for our work together. The metaphor I often give is us hiking together: The client chooses what mountain we're going to climb. And while I may critique the client's technique or offer options for how to cross that ravine, it is the client who must ultimately do the work, make the changes, and get to the other side, albeit with me as a supportive partner every step of the way.
About Mike
Mike completed a BA in Economics & Finance and an MA in Social-Organizational Psychology from Columbia University, where he is a PhD research fellow in the Department of Organization & Leadership.
While at Columbia, Mike co-founded Crown Consulting with nine consultants from Columbia University and the United States Military Academy at West Point. He has likewise coached similar consulting teams.
Before coming to Columbia, Mike consulted to the MBA program at Harvard Business School, and worked in marketing research at MIT’s Sloan School of Management. He is also the founder of Right-Brained Economics, a learning and development training organization for financial services professionals and organizations.
Prior to that, Mike worked as a financial management consultant at IBM.
EDUCATION
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Columbia University, PhD (in process), Organizational Psychology
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Columbia Business School/Graduate School of Education, Coaching Certification (2023 expected)
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Columbia University, MA, Organizational Psychology, 2022
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American University/Kogod School of Business, BA, Economics & Finance
MY PRACTICE AREAS
Below you'll find descriptions of how I work with clients, given their objectives.
LEADERSHIP, INFLUENCE, & PEOPLE DYNAMICS
Understand people (including yourself). Engage skillfully.
Workplace dynamics are complicated. How do you gain influence with key people? How do you deliver feedback that's both honest and considerate? How do you challenge someone's thinking (or behavior) without creating destructive conflict? Fortunately, there are skillful ways of handling these and other interpersonal situations. That's why I offer coaching around:
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Managing up, down, and across
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Team and group dynamics
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Client relationships
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Negotiation
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Conflict resolution.
GOAL & STRATEGY COACHING
Let me help you get what you really want.
Designed for clients looking to launch ambitious new projects or businesses, goal and strategy coaching draws on organizational-psychology research to help clients:
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Clarify what's truly important
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Formulate concrete goals around these priorities
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Build in milestones, timetables, and other measures to ensure motivation, accountability, and completion.
We'll hold regular check-in meetings, where I'll help you diagnose obstacles, identify root causes, and talk you through problem-solving strategies—all in a safe, supportive, and confidential environment, so you'll have support from ideation to completion.
DEVELOPMENT COACHING
Become the smartest, most effective version of yourself.
Development coaching combines any or all of the modalities described above. Using frameworks and tools from psychology, neuroscience, behavioral economics, and management science, I'll help you:
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Set direction, to identify what you're working toward
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Develop concrete actions to move you closer to those goals
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Diagnose barriers that stand between you and those objectives
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Identify your own strengths, weaknesses, blind spots, and opportunities
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Build adaptive responses to problems
Like the Harvard Business School case method, I help clients learn from their own experiences in real time. And most importantly, this is done in a safe, confidential, and nonjudgmental space. To paraphrase the famed author, executive coach, and business-school professor Stephen R. Covey, a coach is a supportive partner, not a critic. They are a guide, not a judge. The metaphor I often use is that you and I are hiking together. But you pick which mountain we're going to climb (i.e. the goal, the direction). I'll give you feedback, saying things like "Watch out for that ravine up there," or, "I've noticed the way you've repeatedly tried to grip that rock... How is that approach working?". But ultimately, we're training you to be a better explorer, climber, entrepreneur, etc.
CAREER COACHING
Let's get you where you want to be.
With a background in job-market research at Harvard Business School and career counseling at Columbia University, I work with clients at all stages of career development, including:
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Identifying your skills, abilities, work values and interests
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Creating an Ideal Job Profile
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How to network and job-search effectively
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Strategic resume and cover-letter writing
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Interview preparation and coaching
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Negotiation and offer-closing strategies
CONTACT ME / BOOK A FREE CONSULTATION
I believe that everyone deserves a great fit with their coach; so I offer a free one-hour consultation to learn about them, their goals or challenges, and what they hope to get out of coaching. Then, I'll sketch out personalized a plan for our work together, so you can make an informed decision before you commit to any paid sessions. To set up your free consultation, just fill out the form on the right and I’ll be in touch with you very shortly!
—Mike
PHONE
(617) 209-9834
