Melissa’s Memos
Your Resume Doesn’t Get You Hired
In 20+ years of hiring senior talent, the one thing I rarely tell candidates out loud: Your resume isn’t supposed to get you hired. It’s supposed to buy you 15 minutes in a room. That’s it. That’s the whole job of the document. The problem is that most senior candidates treat the resume like a…
Read MoreWhat is Coaching?
People sometimes ask me what a coaching session really looks like. It’s a fair question. “Coaching” is one of those words that can mean almost anything depending on who you’re talking to. Here’s what it looks like in my practice. It usually starts with what the person says they need. Resume help. Interview prep. LinkedIn…
Read MoreSenior Leaders Communication Distortion
There is a communication pattern I see repeatedly in senior leaders and it costs them more than they realize. It shows up in interviews. In boardrooms. In high-stakes presentations. And most of the time, the person doing it has no idea. It’s over-qualification. “This might not be the right answer, but…” “I could be wrong…
Read MoreMomentum doesn’t start until action does
You’re not stuck in your search. You’re busy avoiding it. There’s a version of job search activity that feels productive but creates zero forward movement. I see it constantly — especially in senior leaders who are disciplined, high-achieving people in every other area of their lives. It looks like this: Avoiding in a senior search…
Read MoreUncertainty in a Career Pivot
Late 2025, I walked away from a full-time corporate career I’d spent 30 years building. That’s not a humble brag. It was genuinely disorienting. I had built something substantial. A reputation, a network, a track record inside organizations that I was proud of. And I chose to leave it. Not because it stopped working, but…
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