Carlos Martin: Why I Became an Executive Coach
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Through my career, I crossed industries and defied convention to pursue my happy place - the intersection of people and systems. My non-traditional path to leadership provided what I now understand is my most valuable gift: a range of experiences that expand perspectives.
Yet, just a few years ago, I couldn’t tell you that.
I was lost.
I left Corporate America as a sales executive without a next step. This seemed perfectly rational (and still holds logic today!) However, I was fully unprepared for what’s next, a question that used to thrill me.
My lone wolf mentality and my build-the-plane-as-I-fly-it approach to life no longer drove me. I lacked clarity, motivation, focus and vision. Nothing made sense.
Around the same time, my brother Alejandro Martin pursued executive coaching to expand his own value. Early in his experience, he suggested I consider becoming an executive coach. Instead, I explored literally every other question, option and career.
All I knew is I didn’t know.
All paths left me feeling like a square peg in a round hole. Something didn’t fit. And that something was me. I was stuck with uncertainty and discontent - that heavy, frustrating phase where we think digging in harder gives us control. The only thing I hadn’t tried was not trying.To me, that was illogical.
It turns out that irrational option proved the most powerful one. I discovered I no longer felt at home in my own life or my own skin.
My AHA! Moment
I realized I wasn’t lost; I outgrew myself.
This clarity overruled my need for certainty. In fact, it opened the next two doors, each presenting a question too basic to be productive:
What do I know?
What don’t I know?
I knew from my previous role that I loved to motivate my team. I lived to inspire them toward their business objectives and to overall be better. I loved how the dynamics we fostered allowed them to improve both personal and professional lives.
I knew creating meaningful connections came naturally to me. My best business outcomes start with human connection rather than a business transaction.
I didn’t know life was preparing me for a new chapter - a way of thinking, a way of being, a way of showing up in the world.
I do this work because
I did the work.
I started my next chapter at the Hudson Institute of Coaching where my purpose finally found a place and a path. I took what I love most about life and leadership - meaningful connections, growth mindset, people-first focus, emotional intelligence - and made them the filters through which I experience the world.
But “becoming” is hard work! It takes time to sit in discomfort to reshape - much less reinvent - yourself.
I originally wanted to be comfortable with the uncomfortable. Now, I’ve shifted to being comfortable with the unknown. I found the unknown is also full of amazing possibilities and opportunities!
I shifted from a scarcity mindset to an abundant mindset. Once I made the leap, I could see possibilities everywhere.
I learned the stories I’d always told myself - my personal narrative - were outdated. I both mourned and celebrated my “old” self, honoring the totality of my life so I could make space for a new narrative.
I recognized I allowed work to define much of my identity. Society insists on separating our identity between home and work. They are inextricably linked. We contain multitudes! Our humanity makes us good at what we do, not the other way around.
We are both, and.
The work works.
Did it happen overnight? I would like to say yes, but the reality was absolutely not. I am ever changing. It took time to create a new narrative and identity. Who I was, who I am now and who I’ve yet to become may differ immensely.
I believe one of the most powerful things we can do is invite change, then lean into it with curiosity.
I’ve found my life to be like a river; at times I’m stuck in an eddy, others navigating rough waters. More than I’d care to admit, I’m fighting against the flow.
I know with certainty that when I stop fighting, I hit a flow state of mind and things fall into place.
I know with certainty that when we consider what can go right instead of wrong, we stop fearing the unknown to wonder at possibility.
I know with certainty that becoming an executive coach transformed how I experience the world and how I experience meaningful connection.
My most profound moments are witnessing my clients’ Aha moments when new perspectives lead to new directions. I live to help others sit confidently in their uncertainty, leverage their vulnerability for clarity, and explore different questions to reduce or even remove doubt.
An executive coach never stops growing.
I am a life-long learner; a sponge for new information through study and people. Every client brings an opportunity to challenge and expand my own beliefs.
I like to think my clients have also made me a better person - they expand my empathy and emotional intelligence; I am hyper-aware of my words, how others feel, how I speak to myself. I now experience deeper, more meaningful and fulfilling relationships across my whole life - and especially in my work.
Coaching the Whole Person is how I experience all of this on purpose, with purpose.
I’ll leave you with this question: