Learn how to mobilize change on tough challenges.
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Frameworks and reflexes that get to the heart of the issue in front of you, and move it forward:
I work with people and teams in the public and mission-driven sectors to build the capacity to face complexity, hold tension, and move forward together.
My approach is grounded in Adaptive Leadership, a methodology developed over forty years at the Harvard Kennedy School and used in hundreds of contexts around the world. It starts with the insight that we are often trapped in our own narratives about the world - and that making progress on difficult challenges requires taking a step outside of these, to see things as they are.
You don’t solve an adaptive challenge. You work it, by helping others learn, experiment and adapt.
Leadership Coaching
For mission-driven professionals working to create change — who feel stuck in organizational dynamics or frustrated that their efforts aren’t producing the results they want.
Maybe you’ve tried to move an initiative forward, but can’t seem to gain traction.
Maybe you’re caught in complex team dynamics, or facing resistance from people whose support you need.
Or maybe you sense that the challenge isn’t just “out there,” but has something to do with how you’re showing up.
With a decade of experience spanning civic institutions, local government, and adult development theory, I help clients see the connection between the systems they’re trying to change and the inner patterns that keep them stuck.
In Coaching, we look at your leadership challenge from multiple angles:
From the outside-in: we use a practical set of tools to diagnose what’s happening in your team or organization and uncover leverage points for change.
From the inside-out: we explore what transformation might be required in you — your habits, interpretations, or mindset — to shift the system you operate in.
Things we might explore:
Purpose and alignment: Are you and your colleagues working toward the same goals—or different ones?
Group dynamics: How are relationships and roles on your team shaping the challenge you’re facing?
Identity and authority: How do questions of race, gender, power, and belonging shape what’s happening in your team or organization?
Hidden commitments: What fears or needs might be keeping you, or others, from acting differently?
Teaching & Facilitation
I design and teach learning experiences that help participants see their systems more clearly and act more effectively within them. My pedagogy develops skills in systems thinking, reflective practice, and the capacity to intervene for meaningful change.
This includes one-off workshops, short-term intensives, and semester-long university courses. I’ve taught policy students at the Harvard Kennedy School, design and planning students at MIT and Wentworth Institute of Technology, and healthcare professionals through the Global Fund and St. Jude Children’s Hospital.
I also train changemakers and activists to deepen their effectiveness by exploring identity, belonging, and how to learn from conflict.
Consulting
I help organizations see and address the root causes of their toughest challenges. Using the Adaptive Leadership framework, I work with teams to uncover the cultural, relational, and structural dynamics that hold problems in place — from organizational identity and authority patterns to questions of trust, belonging, and resistance to change.
My work often begins with a diagnostic deep dive: interviews and system mapping to clarify what’s really happening beneath the surface. From there, we design tailored interventions — assembling cross-level steering groups, facilitating team dialogues, or integrating targeted coaching and training — to help the organization learn its way forward.
In past consulting work, I’ve helped city governments (Boston, MA; Everett, MA; Aubervilliers, France) and nonprofits (Friends of Waterfront Seattle; Welcoming America) make progress on complex, human-centered challenges.
What this work looks like:
Diagnosis & Framing: Uncover the hidden dynamics — relationships, incentives, and unspoken loyalties — that sustain challenges, and clarify your shared purpose or theory of change.
Leadership & Team Workshops: Facilitate Adaptive Leadership sessions that strengthen teams’ capacity to navigate uncertainty, hold tension, and build common purpose.
Civic Engagement & Stakeholder Dialogue: Partner with cities and nonprofits to design participatory processes that foster trust, inclusion, and collaborative action.
About Géraud
I help people pay attention — without judgment — to their own presence, to the quality of their relationships, and to the underlying dynamics of the groups they’re part of that signal something is ready to shift. My role is to create the container, with both support and challenge, in which individuals and groups can grow their capacity to navigate complexity.
I trained and taught at the Harvard Kennedy School and MIT, working with hundreds of graduate students and mid-career professionals on leadership and transformation. Earlier in my career, I spent eight years working on place-based change: consulting with the United Nations in India and with local governments and civil-sector organizations in France and the United States.
Now based in Paris, France, but raised across three continents, I carry a deep curiosity for how people and systems grow — and how cultures learn to hold conflict and live together.
“Géraud’s poignant questioning draws forward what is most true and courageous. He helped me see myself through new eyes — and embody a more grounded, expressive leadership presence.”
-Milly R., Coaching Client
Get in Touch
If you’re curious about working together, or wondering how coaching or facilitation might support your next step, please reach out. Send a message, or schedule a free 30-minute exploratory conversation below.