Swaying Toward Success

After spending several decades as a corporate executive, HOLLY SEGUR is following her dream. The owner of Lead Intuitively, she is a personal coach who assists professional women in navigating the demands and choices of complex lives.

“I help high-achieving women get ‘the title’ without losing themselves,” Segur says. “I love ambitious professionals who are tenacious enough to grow a career in corporate America or to start their own business.”

In other words, she uses her personal and professional experience to counsel younger women who, like her, want to do everything, and do it well. “I know a lot of ambitious and high-achieving women in Wilmington who are struggling with work-life balance, but there is no such thing,” she says. “Instead, there is work-life sway. You sway among family, personal, and work [demands], creating a sense of flow back and forth.”

Swaying, she explains, acknowledges and accepts the fact that different parts of one’s life will need more attention and effort at different times. The essential thing is to hold onto what is important while building a career or business. Segur likes to think of the process in visual terms, enabling each client to create a picture of her context.

“I’ve developed what I call a life strategy canvas. To start, you need to capture who you are right now and who you want to remain. What relationships are non-negotiable? For example, what does an engaged mother look like? [The process involves] being very intentional and very conscious about what you value and what’s important, and staying focused on that so [you] don’t get lost in your achievements. Being accountable,” she says.

Segur modeled her life canvas concept after a strategy document she used as an executive at Corning, at whose New York headquarters she spent her executive career. The self-assessment looks at a person’s “wheel of life,” as she calls it: values, important relationships, support relationships, circles of influence, and long-term goals. To that canvas, the client adds three things to work on in the coming year to advance who she is and to advance her brand, Segur says, adding, “Those are always in pencil because sometimes you have to make changes.”

“You have to be conscious of how you’re swaying,” she says. “Communication is absolutely essential, as is transparency. Make sure that others are fully and transparently understanding you.” For women who have families, especially, the journey involves logistics management and calendaring, involving each family member. Who needs to be where, and when? What needs to be accomplished this week? What is non-negotiable?

An important aspect of learning to sway is to be realistic about what you can accomplish in a given year, Segur adds, especially when you are trying to maintain important relationships. “Set yourself up at the beginning of the year with your vision book,” she advises. “Ambition and achievement are like a drug: if someone dangles an opportunity in front of you, you may have a hard time saying no. You may start to abandon what you had before. I use my work with clients to support them but also remind them to stay in touch with who they are.”

Some of Segur’s clients do not feel supported by their spouses. She points out that they cannot change those people, so if the spouse doesn’t choose to change, how can the client move forward and honor herself and her marriage?

Segur knows whereof she speaks. “I’ve been there, I’ve done it; I’ve been in those pinch-points,” she says. “I know what can send someone into a panic. I understand that magnetic pull inside high achievers. The question is, how do you stay healthy and married?”

Segur began dreaming of a life coach vocation some years ago when she was still at Corning and realized her own journey was guided by several strong women who mentored her. She wanted to draw on her life experience as a woman growing her career while going through a divorce and then, as a single mother, managing her children and providing care for elderly family members. “I knew I would love to become a mentor for other women who want to achieve professional success, but keeping them from making the same mistakes I did,” she says.

She established Lead Intuitively in 2017 but left it dormant until she was ready to retire. The retirement prompt happened when she came to Wilmington on vacation in 2021. “I spontaneously bought a house I fell in love with, and relocated to Wilmington in 2022,” she says. “I pulled [Lead Intuitively] out and said, ‘Okay; it’s time.’”

Segur tailors her coaching arrangements to fit the needs of each client. Some clients want consistent counseling over a set period of time; others want a more flexible approach that allows them to check in with Segur when they need a boost over a hurdle or help in making an important decision within the context of their life canvas.

While most of her clients are in the career-growing period of their lives, Segur has also worked with high-achievers who are transitioning to retirement. She has experience there as well. “The canvas can be adapted for that phase of life,” she says, pointing out that for ambitious women staring down retirement, “That can be terrifying; we don’t know that version of ourselves; we’ve never met her.”

To view more of photographer Terah Hoobler’s work, go to terahhoobler.com.

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