STAND OUT AMONG THE ELITE

Stand out among the elite

Competition is stiffer at your level. The stakes are higher. Slip-ups or missteps are costlier and more visible. You’re under scrutiny by the C-suite, and you know it. Dr. Fish can help you develop higher level leadership behaviors and deal with the complex dynamics that often characterize top-tier executive playing fields. Using validated assessments, Dr. Fish can help you expand your awareness beyond how you see yourself to include how peers and the senior leaders who will decide your career path—the CEO, the executive board and even your competitors for top positions—see you. With that information in hand, Dr. Fish can help you develop advanced competencies in a neutral, confidential and supportive environment. Because executives at your level are smart and accomplished, Dr. Fish can address much more complex dynamics and aid you toward recognition of subtle but destructive patterns rather than offering a one-time solution, which is common in many coaching experiences.

Fix corporate dynamics spun out of control

You have plenty of responsibility without dealing with stressful interpersonal battles among your direct reports, yet every cliche from the leadership books you’ve read seems to have sprung to life in your division: turf wars, backstabbing, political gamesmanship, he-said/she-said scenarios, poisonous culture. It’s exhausting. And if you don’t figure out how to fix it soon, shareholders will add their own dissatisfied voices to the cacophony. Sometimes you might know precisely the source of the problem, whether it’s a structural issue in your organization or a personality or behavioral issue in an executive. Knowing how to start the difficult conversations around the problem and how to shift stakeholders’ engagement, however, can be challenging. Dr. Fish can support your leaders through change and help calm tensions as fierce biases are set aside to enable forward motion in your organization again. Other times, multiple issues and players create a tangled mess of hidden motivations, entrenched positions and grating personalities, making it difficult to know how to shift the pieces without bringing productivity to a halt. Dr. Fish can assess the drivers behind the gridlock and work with key executives to challenge their thinking and to dismantle the barriers—both personal and organizational—to progress.

“I’m right…Period.”

One challenging assignment required making a way for a particularly recalcitrant Fortune 50 executive to hear constructive criticism and develop into a team player. Read More

Enthusiasm gone awry

A brusque interpersonal style made for a bumpy re-entry to the U.S. for one accomplished ex-pat executive. Read more

Opportunity knocks on a firmly shut door

Can an “ice cube” melt fast enough to preserve her shot at being CEO? Read More

People-pleasing childhood getting in the way

A devastating performance review leads to a challenging personal transformation for one C-level exec. Read More

Triage in a poisonous culture

The phone call to explain just the bare bones of one very messed-up situation took a full two hours. Read more

Developing the backbone to stand down the superstar

Fierce tension developed when a superstar was imported into a culture with quite a few very competent people already in play. Read More

Dr. Debra Fish

Prior to establishing Fish Executive Leadership Group in 2011, Dr. Fish served as director of tGCP, a Pennsylvania-based firm that delivered strategy advance consulting and addressed development needs with rising executives at Fortune 500 clients. Dr. Fish earlier spent several years working in corporate management, giving her a hands-on view of how national and global firms operate. She also headed her own consulting psychology practice, which focused on the needs of large corporate clients.

Clients

Clients include key executives at large privately held and Fortune 500 firms in retail, hospital systems, financial services, payment reconciliation, publishing, higher education, manufacturing, distribution, aviation, entertainment, IT and legal services.

Assessments

Dr. Fish has extensive training in rigorous diagnostic and assessment techniques and uses those to help clients identify individual and organizational strengths as well as development opportunities. She is credentialed to administer and interpret Hogan Assessments, the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator and 16PF and ASSESS Systems’ evaluations.

Community leadership

Because of her deep interest in the factors that enable women to become strong leaders, Dr. Fish served as Chair of the Women on Corporate Boards committee established by CABLE, a networking organization for professional women that produces an annual census of women on corporate boards in Tennessee. She also served on the board of ION, a national consortium of women’s professional networking organizations focused on increasing the number of women in executive suites and on corporate boards. From 2013 to 2014, Dr. Fish chaired the board of the Mental Health Association of Middle Tennessee. She is a member of Leadership Health Care.

Speaking engagements

Dr. Fish has spoken about leadership issues at the National Association of Women MBAs, the Healthcare Financial Management Association’s women’s conference and the Annual Summit of the Women Business Leaders in the U.S. Health Care Industry Foundation (WBL).

Education

A Nashville native, Dr. Fish earned a B.S. in Human Development at Vanderbilt University, a Master of Arts degree in Clinical Psychology from Pepperdine University and a Doctor of Psychology degree from Fuller Theological Seminary, Graduate School of Psychology. She lives in Nashville with her family and a small menagerie of fish and dogs.

Clients served

Dr. Fish has served key executives in many industries.

Dr. Fish has served key executives in many industries. Retail Financial services Hospital systems Aviation Payment reconciliation Publishing Higher education Manufacturing Distribution Entertainment IT Legal services Government Banking

Dr. Fish is credentialed to administer and interpret several validated assessments, including:

  • Hogan Assessments
  • the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator
  • 16PF evaluations
  • ASSESS Systems’ evaluations