Executive Advisor & Trusted Partner | Author
Supporting founders and senior leaders to reclaim the freedom they hoped success would bring.
I've built my life by listening to what feels deeply true.
There comes a point when success no longer feels like the freedom you thought it would. On the outside, things may look good. You are capable, respected, and doing work that matters.
Yet quietly, the way you are leading, working, and carrying responsibility may no longer fit who you are now. You may be holding more than you want to keep holding. Making decisions from momentum rather than choice. Wondering when the freedom you worked so hard to create became another set of responsibilities to manage.
This is often a transition point, a moment when the way forward requires something different from the way that brought you here.
My Story
In 1993, that inner knowing guided me to found one of the world's first Virtual Assistant companies, long before remote work became a movement. I was not following a trend; I had a deep sense that work could be more relational, more human, and more meaningful.
More than three decades later, that same instinct still guides me.
These days, it leads me less toward doing more and more toward asking better questions:
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What is true now?
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What still belongs?
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What am I ready to stop carrying?
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What wants my attention next?
Who I Work With
Today, I serve as an advisor and trusted guide to founders, senior leaders, and changemakers who have built something meaningful but are beginning to question what their success is costing them.
My clients are not usually looking to reinvent themselves. They are ready to reignite themselves.
They want space to slow down, think clearly, and hear their own judgment again without the constant pressure to perform, decide, produce, and prove.
They have already created success. Now they are asking how to reclaim more of the freedom, energy, and choice they hoped it would bring.
How I Work
At the heart of my work is grounded awareness. I integrate leadership strategy with presence-based Dialogue, creating conditions where individuals and teams can listen deeply, speak honestly, and pay attention to what is actually happening.
When people have enough space to be honest about what is really going on, patterns become easier to see, and the next wise action becomes clearer.
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Sometimes that means changing a decision.
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Sometimes it means changing a pattern.
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Sometimes it means changing what one person has been carrying for far too long.
The work is thoughtful, practical, and rooted in the belief that clarity often appears when we create enough room to hear what is already trying to get our attention.
The Business of Being in Business™
Business is never only about the business. It is also about the decisions we carry, the people who depend on us, the relationships we navigate, the pressure we absorb, and the person we become while building something that matters.
I call this The Business of Being in Business™ ... the larger body of thought behind my work, and an exploration of the human side of leadership, entrepreneurship, responsibility, and growth.
Success should create more freedom, not quietly consume it.
Through my writing, advising, programs, and the community now taking shape, my passion is in exploring a more human way to live, lead and work.
The Business of Being in Business™ Newsletter
Weekly reflections on leadership, responsibility, freedom, and the human side of building something meaningful.
Susan Marie Taylor
If success has brought more responsibility than freedom, and you’re ready for a different way forward ...
Welcome. I’m glad you’re here.
What This Work Looks Like in Practice ...
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Leadership Renewal: Supporting leaders to expand their capacity, make clearer decisions, strengthen collaboration, and create cultures where responsibility does not depend on one person carrying everything.
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Cultural Healing: Facilitating Dialogue within teams and organizations to rebuild trust, strengthen psychological safety, surface what has been difficult to say, and create new possibilities for how people work together.
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Leadership Transition: Coaching founders, executives, and leaders who have reached a point where what once worked no longer fully fits, helping them clarify what matters now and make thoughtful changes in how they work, lead, and live.
Whether I am working with an individual, a team, or a larger system, my role is to create the conditions for people to see more clearly what is happening, hear what is true, and choose what comes next with greater intention.
For many leaders, one of the most important shifts is recognizing that capacity does not come only from becoming better at carrying more.
Sometimes it comes from changing what needs to depend on you in the first place.
When everything depends on you, responsibility can become a trap.
If one decision, responsibility, or recurring issue keeps finding its way back to you, start there.
In a complimentary 30-minute Responsibility Reset, we will focus on one issue that is consuming more of your time, energy, or attention than it should.
Together, we'll identify what keeps you in the middle of it and choose one practical change that can reduce how much of your capacity it consumes.
One issue. One practical change. More capacity to lead.