Lauren Gold
Your Mastermind Founder and Leader
My Story
Sister, I have been around the block and back!
I've experienced professional highs when winning three national awards to a professional low of being fired by a bipolar boss. From decades in HR, Brand Management, and Sales to launching an agency, I realized that my experience, skills, and philosophy of service excellence would be optimized when helping other women executives get the exact support and answers they need without the fear of being embarrassed, rejected, humiliated, invalidated, not enough, difficult, overly-challenging, without makeup, demanding - you name it.
When I launched my agency, I noticed that it was extra challenging for some tech CEOs and CMOs (men) to provide us with opportunities even though they liked our work. Looking back, had I known then what I know now this would not have been a stumbling block.
Coupled with this, there was a period of time when I simply didn’t know how to sell and had I known sooner how important this was I would have acquired those skills years ago. Thanks to YouTube, I learned a sales process until I became fearless. If I had a support network and regular coaching it would have generated a completely different outcome for me.
At the same time, I had to be 100% available for my special needs son. Those of you who are moms may even have more challenging situations than I do.
It was my lightbulb moment. I realized that my zone of excellence was always and is providing advanced developmental opportunities to others and facilitating undeniably remarkable experiences. Women need this support more than ever and it made sense to put my 30+ years of experience to work in the service of women who are Marketing Agency Owners and CEOs.
Throughout these years, I met other women who had similar roles but didn't have access to the boys club, or because of family responsibilities couldn't travel for 2-3 days for a Mastermind meeting. Finally, it is a fact that most Masterminds require an investment of $25,000 - $100,000 plus travel expenses, and sometimes that's just not practical.
What Elevate 40 provides is a community of awesome women executives in an environment of complete trust where each sister is completely supported…in other words, a sisterhood. You will have a go-to set of like-minded women Marketing Agency Owners and CEOs who both understand your pain and can support your success.
I have learned that life is just too complex to manage alone, especially as an agency executive who is a woman. The time for leading alone is over because Elevate 40 and our sisterhood are here for you.
My Qualifications
With 30+ years of deep experience and education in executive development, group dynamics, marketing agency ownership, business management, finance, operations, and learning, Lauren values your time and your commitment to investing in yourself. She has coached and provided consulting services to more than a thousand Fortune 500 CEOs and Presidents, and Fortune 100 VPs, CMOs, CROs, and more.
Lauren has always valued learning and earned her AA in Psychology from Green Mountain College in Vermont, a BS in Business and Human Resources Management from Northeastern University in Boston, graduating cum Laude, and an MBA from Nova Southeastern University in Ft. Lauderdale, Florida, graduating Magna cum Laude with a post-graduate specialty in Finance. Lauren’s Master's Degree Thesis was an application of Herzberg’s Theory of Motivation to manufacturing employees while in Moscow, Russia. Lauren then earned a post-graduate certificate in Organization Development from New School University in New York.
Throughout her career, her work required her to become certified in every program she had the desire to facilitate. Some of these certifications include Advanced Change Management (Conner Partners, LLC), Executive Coaching (Marshall Goldsmith), Coaching and Feedback, Performance Management, Facilitation Skills, Behavioral Interviewing (DDI), Management Development, and Career Development (Baxter Management Institute), among others.
Lauren’s proudest professional accomplishment was winning three nationally recognized awards after only one year of launching a corporate university by the American Quality and Productivity Council. The awards were Most Innovative Corporate University, Best New Corporate University, and Corporate University Leader of the Year.
With her HR experience complete, Lauren went on sabbatical and decided to prep for agency life by acquiring design skills while making the process completely fun. She attended the 2nd best Game Design school in the U.S., DigiPen Institute of Technology, where she majored in Digital Animation. Simultaneously, she attended Lake Washington Institute of Technology to get deep learning in the Adobe suite of products through to achieving her Adobe Certified Design Expert certification.
She published her first book, "Handbook for Creating an Innovating Corporate University: The Unwritten Rules for Success" in 2006, and her eBook, "77 Ways Marketing Agencies Can Grow Revenue" will be available on Kindle in 2022.
Lauren’s mission and trademark for over 25 years has been creating optimal experiences for people. Unlike so many coaches, facilitators, and programs, Lauren truly desires to deliver value. She is not content to simply offer information and get by with the minimum - she is seriously committed to helping others improve. To Lauren, transformation, maximizing personal experience, and fulfillment are more important than squeezing people into a conference room or Zoom call.