Mary Marshall began her business career running a small, family-owned business. Learning the details of small business operations and management led her to a career coaching small and medium-size business entrepreneurs who were interested in selling their companies. After three years of successfully completing many mergers and acquisitions, Mary was fascinated by one small high-tech company and accepted a position as Sales and Operations Manager. In less than three years the company grew from $250K in revenue to over $5MM, with Nintendo and Microsoft included as clients. She was then hired to create a value-added resale channel and start a branch operation for a similar business that led her to become Vice President of the company. She became an owner and President of the company after completing a successful turnaround in less than a year.
After selling her business to a partner in 2000, she launched a career as a consultant, primarily focused on operations management and organizational development. This expanded to executive coaching and becoming a Vistage Chair in Seattle, running a successful Chair Practice. Vistage International is the world’s leading peer advisory membership organization, serving more than 20,000 CEOs and senior executives in 15 countries. Mary successfully ran 4 CEO and Key Executive groups working with over 50 local CEOs. During her time as a Vistage Chair Mary received many awards including the Rookie of the Year, the Chair Excellence Award, the Master Chair designation, and the Star Award. She was consistently ranked among the top Vistage Chairs in the country and was the first woman in Vistage history to hold the #1 Chair ranking for the US.
In 2008 Mary accepted a position with Vistage running the Western Division. She managed the growth of the division and training and development for approximately 200 Chairs. Mary was promoted in early 2009 to run Training and Development for the entire organization, Chair Selection and New Group starts in addition to her role as Western Division SVP. Her work focused on how the Chairs (Consultants) could grow their practices by finding the right entrepreneurs and businesses to join their groups.
In late 2012 Mary left corporate life at Vistage to go back to what she loves best – working with entrepreneurs to help them achieve their dreams. She launched Marshall Advisors, LLC as a CEO and Executive Advisory agency to work with CEOs and their executive teams to help them achieve their goals more quickly and efficiently, and have some fun while doing it! As a part of her practice, she also teaches a course for Entrepreneurs for the SBA called Emerging Leaders. She helps the business get over the hurdles of entrepreneurship so they can thrive.
In addition to her coaching and executive advisory work, Mary has also become an author. Her book, “Putting Together the Entrepreneurial Puzzle,” was published in 2014 and, “How NOT to Be a Leader,” which she co-authored with Kim Obbink, came out in 2017. Her latest book, “The Great Culture [Dis]Connect,” was published in 2018. Also, in 2018, Mary was named the U.S. Small Business Administration (SBA) 2018 SBA Seattle District Small Business Champion of the Year.
Mary also is a member of WIPP (Women Impacting Public Policy), advocating for women business owners and participated in Small Business Saturdays.
Recent Coaching Situations
- Provided coaching for Executive Director of fast-growing non-profit for leadership skills, board development, and mission, vision, and values work. As a result, the leader was able to secure multiple new grants, restructure organization for the future.
- Provided coaching to new CEO who succeeded her father in the business. Developed strategy for her to succeed, recognize her strengths and successfully build on the legacy of the organization.
- Executive Coach for an attorney through transition from private practice to successfully joining a larger firm and doubling his business.
- Executive Coach for Sr. VP of manufacturing company who was new to the role. Helped her navigate the organization, develop her leadership skills and strategy for her department to align with the larger organization.
- CEO coach for a business that tripled in size over three years by developing an organizational structure for growth. Developing leadership strengths, managing out some executive team members and onboarding new leadership. Helped develop a strategy that led to a winning sales team and a “Best Places to Work” award.
Professional Expertise
- Leadership assessment and development
- CEO & Senior executive coaching
- Strategic Planning & implementation
- Emotional Intelligence, using EQ-i 2.0 and other EQ
assessment tools - New leader on-boarding
- Executive team coaching and development
- Values & Organizational Cultural identification and training
- Professional & Personal Goal setting for work/life balance
- Leading through Transition/Change
- Hiring & hiring training
- Organizational Development
- Sales & sales management training
- Re-organization facilitation & training
- Strengths-Based Leadership Assessment
- Retreat facilitation
- Intentional Culture Speaker
- Author: Putting together the Entrepreneurial Puzzle: The 10
pieces every business needs to succeed - Author: The Great Culture [Dis]Connect: Building a Business Culture that Works
- Co-author: How NOT to Be a Leader
Education
B.A., Psychology, International Affairs, Lewis and Clark College