Meet Erica Zygelman | Integrative Leadership Coach

We had the good fortune of connecting with Erica Zygelman and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Erica, what matters most to you?
My core value (and the essence of my Integrative Leadership Coaching business) is that you can be a highly successful leader without compromising your well-being.

There is a pattern plaguing brilliant leaders in the corporate world: in order to climb the ladder and achieve the salary, promotion, and seniority you desire, you believe you must shift into overdrive and sacrifice yourself. Without tools, training, or support.

Through my own 15-year corporate leadership journey at tech companies and startups, I learned (the hard way) that the opposite is true. When your mind and body are in survival mode, creativity flows less freely, solutions arrive slowly, and your vision gets clouded, making it harder to be an effective leader.

The first thing I focus on with my high-achieving clients is reclaiming their well-being and increasing their self-awareness. From a fully nourished and resourced place, the sky is the limit on how much success they can experience and thrive while doing it.

Alright, so for those in our community who might not be familiar with your business, can you tell us more?
As an Integrative Leadership Coach, I’m devoted to helping new and rising leaders shift out of survival mode so they can reclaim their energy, their health, and their truth and thrive in their leadership roles.

The more leaders and people rising into leadership who understand that the key to success is an inside job, the more we can heal burn-out, raise the collective consciousness, and solve business problems with sustainable win-win outcomes.

I have a 15+ year track record of leading high-performing corporate managers and teams at world-class tech organizations including Apple, Spotify, and Parsley Health. I am also well versed in overcoming the pitfalls of self-sacrifice and burnout from my personal experience and observing these patterns throughout my corporate career.

I’ve personally experienced what it feels like to operate with an empty cup, and I felt like a shell of myself. It left me depleted and exhausted. Suffering from symptoms of chronic stress.

Eventually, these feelings of listlessness drove me to explore holistic wellness. I got certified to teach yoga and completed a full year of training as a Functional Medicine Certified Health Coach.

Over the years, I deepened my self-knowledge, broadened my perspective, and built my personal toolkit of nourishing practices. I learned how to rest, cook, meditate, and reflect. I really got to know myself and my body’s unique rhythms, and observed that when I felt better, I performed better.

Learning how to integrate holistic practices and embracing a conscious mindset, gave me the opportunity to choose how I want to live and lead. It also soon revealed the value of teaching my direct reports how to create this lifestyle for themselves.

This was the secret sauce for me to rise to the top of my career as a senior leader at some world-class companies, and support others in rising into their power too.

Ultimately, it’s the inspiration behind my Integrative Leadership Coaching business. Leaders deserve so much more. No one should have to go through what I did when there are proven practices, skills and tools that can support the transition into leadership. It’s my great privilege to advocate for you to achieve success with greater well-being, freedom, and ease too.

Today I work with clients inside private and group coaching programs, and also support corporate management teams via coaching, training, and workshops. My methodology integrates principles of conscious leadership, positive psychology, and holistic wellness that I have acquired through my corporate leadership experience, coaching certification, and yoga teacher training.

If you had a friend visiting you, what are some of the local spots you’d want to take them around to?
After growing up in Connecticut and spending the past 15 years in New York City, I relocated to San Diego, CA during the pandemic. I am totally smitten with this city! I love hosting friends and family when they come to visit, especially those escaping frigid northeast winters. San Diego has it all: gorgeous beaches to surf and snorkel, hiking trails, museums and cultural sites, and tons of great food.

One of my favorite things to do is visit the Coronado and Ocean Beach dog beaches. You just can’t help but be happy seeing hundreds of dogs running free and splashing in the waves. The San Diego zoo is the best in the world, and some of my local friends have annual passes so we can visit often (I’m clearly an animal lover).

It’s a very active city so I’ve picked my old rollerblading habit back up, which I hadn’t done in years! Turns out it’s a very popular Mission Beach boardwalk activity and never went out of style here. I also just started surf lessons and am excited to improve my skills.

I live in the Little Italy neighborhood, but my favorite Italian restaurant is Cesarina in Point Loma Heights. Ironside is my favorite local restaurant – the best seafood and cocktails! I also love casual dinners at The Presley in Liberty Station.

One of my favorite pastimes is attending potluck dinner club gatherings with the new friends I’ve made here. We rotate hosting and pick a theme, such a fun way to spend a night and a good excuse to test out new recipes.

Shoutout is all about shouting out others who you feel deserve additional recognition and exposure. Who would you like to shoutout?
I’ve always said that having a coach is my secret weapon. Over the past decade, I’ve worked with a handful of masterful coaches who specialized in relationships & communication, professional burnout, feminine energetics, and business growth. My life has transformed so dramatically from this work that I was inspired to become a coach myself and help new and rising leaders in the ways I wish I was supported early in my management journey. I dedicate my shoutout to my coaches, teachers and healers, and the lineages of coaches, teachers, and healers who came before them.

Website: https://www.ericazygelman.com

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ericazygelman/

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ericazygelman/

Image Credits
John Dahlgren Nila Buchanan