The road to becoming a Certified SHIFT-IT® Visual Coach
In August of 2011 I was looking for a shift: in my job, my life, my attitude. I was working as a graphic designer at a leadership development company with earbuds in keeping myself busy while being tethered to a desk under fluorescent lights. I had recently sold my arts magazine and make a values-based decision to leave my favorite job ever: exhibits director of an arts center. I didn’t see an inch of my future.
One day when I pulled my ear buds out long enough to go on a break, I was getting up from my desk and overhead in a nearby cubicle the following words:
“...we hired a graphic recorder to come into the meeting...”
Wait, what?
I was a graphic designer who would have loved to attend a meeting where important decisions are being made and create graphics based on the change that needed to happen. Instead, I was a transaction-only, “graphic flipper” miserable about being in a corporate environment with no future.
Instead of taking a break I did a web search of “graphic recorder” and a video of Christina Merkley, of www.shift-it-coach.com, drawing out her own visual journal popped up. I was mesmerized. I had never seen anyone draw and write that fast. It’s seemed so natural and I instantly saw the potential to use the technique in my job and my life.
I did more searches and found www.IFVP.org, the International Forum of Visual Practitioners, and learned about their upcoming conference in Hawaii. I quickly applied and signed up for Alpha Chimp’s and Christina’s Foundations of Interactive Visuals online courses. I made a business case to help fund my efforts and I had earning my visual coaching certification as the pinnacle of achievement.
The next few years was spent practicing listening, drawing, lettering, synthesizing, and learning about facilitation models to help teams become high-performing. I left Korn Ferry International to help build the Visioneering team at OGSystems in Chantilly, Virginia. I presented lettering at two IFVP conferences and at the EuViz conference in Denmark in 2018. After being named a Neuland Ambassador in 2016, I made it a platform from which to spring my visual practitioner career. I launched www.LetsLetterTogether.com in 2017 after leaving Washington, DC shortly after the inauguration.
After a gap year with 6 months of that on the road with a 1947 teardrop trailer (visit www.OnTheRoadWithFlo.com), I knew the way to ground myself back into Southwest Colorado was to pick up the dream of becoming a visual coach again. I applied for and received a career advancement grant with the Colorado Creative Industries and the National Endowment of the Arts. That helped me pay for the training and 9 months later I earned my certification with the SHIFT-IT® Visual Coaching Process. I had been practicing my own form of coaching called Art Career Theorem since 2014 and now I am pulling from both methodologies when needed to support the development of artists careers.
It’s been a long road, but somehow I have been able to manifest my visions, and more. I love seeing the potential in others and helping facilitate the creative expression that is urging to get out.
If you are an artist, or know of an artist in need of support, please have them visit http://www.vizcoach.com to learn more, download helpful resources, and set up a free discovery meeting.
Let me know how I can support you in creating a balanced art life.