Laura Gates, MSOL

Laura Gates is a sought-after executive coach (MSOL, ICF PCC, EMCC), team facilitator and advisor to executives at Silicon Valley’s top tech companies, including Google and LinkedIn, as well as advisor and mentor to VC-backed start-up Founders in tech and bio-tech. She has three decades of coaching and facilitation experience. She is also a founding Core Guide facilitator for Chief, and a Fellow at the Institute for Coaching based at McLean Hospital, an affiliate of Harvard Medical School.

Laura’s prestigious client roster bridges industries and domains including space and aeronautics (NASA, the Florida Space Institute, the International Space Station Research Laboratory), NAVAIR (the aviation division of the Navy), academia (Stanford University, Darden, UCF) energy (Shell Oil, BP) finance and communications (Visa, M+T Bank, LexisNexis, AT+T) government (the Pentagon, DOE, FAA) GOCO (National Laboratories —Sandia, Oak Ridge, Lawrence Livermore), global corporations (Mahindra BT, Quaker Chemical), and non-profits.

Prior to forming Gates Group in 2016, Laura helped grow Learning as Leadership, a French-based leadership training company as it expanded into the US market providing large-scale culture change and leadership development coaching and facilitation. She previously ran a marketing consulting business during San Francisco’s dot.com boom. She started her career on Wall Street in Citibank’s management training program and was the top salesperson for Citibank’s Direct Access, the first-ever home banking technology.

Laura works with clients cross-culturally in the US, Europe and the UK. Many clients lead divisions in EMEA, APAC and LATAM. She has lived in London (twice) and for a year in Montevideo, Uruguay. She is fluent in conversational Spanish and has a working knowledge of French.

Laura received her Masters of Science in Organizational Leadership from the University of Redlands in 2021. She has a B.S. in Business from Syracuse University’s School of Management and Entrepreneurship from the San Francisco Renaissance Entrepreneurship Center.

Laura has written for The Good Men Project, contributed to “A Lesson in Giving,” Stone Soup for the World, Conari Press, authored a bi-weekly “Biz Shrink” column for Women’s Wire, and her articles have appeared in The Good Men Project, Natural Solutions Magazine, City Woman Magazine, Winning Strategies Magazine, the San Jose Business Journal, Sacramento Business Journal, The National Law Journal, and Marketing for Lawyers.

Laura now lives in Central New York after decades of living and working in the San Francisco Bay Area. She and her husband Laurence enjoy walks with their rescue Great Pyrenees, Luna. As a graduate of Syracuse University’s Whitman School of Management, she now advises and volunteers at the school.

Laura’s proprietary frameworks for building innovative teams and cultures by overcoming conflict has been featured in First Round Review. Culture Amp has featured her as a top executive coach and she’s been invited to speak on podcasts and in front of audiences around the globe on purposeful leadership, including the International Space Station Research and Development Conference (ISSRDC), Wisdom 2.0 Unplugged, Berkeley Haas School of Business’s Tru University with True Ventures, VISA Return to Work, (PMI) Project Management Institute of Silicon Valley, American Women in Science, the University of North Texas Conference on Work Teams, Pegasus Systems Thinking Conference and the WIN Conference in Prague and Rome. Podcasts and virtual panels include the Female Quotient, Consciously Unbiased, and Learn to Lead.

An ICF PCC certified coach, EMCC certified in Europe, Laura is also a Marshall Goldsmith Stakeholder Centered coach and advanced certified team coach with the Global Team Coaching Institute with David Clutterbuck and Peter Hawkins.

Laura has studied Emotional Intelligence, Neuroscience in Coaching, Adult Learning Theory as well as David Allen’s Getting Things Done, Crucial Conversations, The Energy Project, Nonviolent Communications and Rational Behavior Therapy with pioneering Howard University Professor Maxie Maulstby.

Laura has been trained in Korn Ferry 360 feedback delivery and is familiar working with tools and assessments such as EQ360, MBTI, DiSC and Birkman. She is skilled at collecting, analyzing and delivering impactful qualitative 360 feedback assessments.

Sarah H. Nicotra, MTP

As the fractional Head of Strategy and Projects, Sarah H. Nicotra drives our team to reach company goals. She's a long-time collaborator with Laura Gates, often working behind the scenes organizing, strategizing, and executing projects.

A broad generalist and multidisciplinary professional, Sarah holds two Master’s degrees in Transpersonal Psychology and Organization Management and a UX diploma. Her mission is to help businesses transform their vision into something impactful, and she’s constantly exploring innovative approaches, including integrating AI, to enhance her work and deliver continuous value.

Daniel de Souza

Originally from Montevideo, Uruguay, Daniel began his design career at Swatch Watch in New York. After attending Parsons School of Design, he moved to San Francisco, where he started working with renowned Representative and Art Consultant Bobbi Wendt. He launched his own photography studio in 1991, working from New York to San Francisco to Miami, adding sound, cinematography, and AI to his suite of creative tools.

Agencies he’s worked with include Foote Cone & Belding, Leagas Delaney, Goodby Silverstein and Partners, Propeller Branding & Tomato. Past clients include Apple, GAP, Levis, Bank of America, Virgin Music, Microsoft, Dell & Alienware.

As an award-winning photographer, his work has been featured in publications such as Communication Arts Magazine and Lürzer's Archive, just to name a few. Daniel’s passion is to tell compelling stories through visual mediums. His natural style, after decades of experience behind the camera, allows clients to relax and feel at ease in front of the camera, allowing their true nature to shine through.