Open Communications · Leadership & team coaching
Inga Michaelsen is an Associate coach with Open Communications, helping leaders and teams build the capacity to perform and relate well, even when the path isn't clear.
Does this sound familiar?
Your team has real talent, and you've worked hard to build something worth leading. But lately, something feels off.
You're not in crisis. But you can see where things are heading if nothing changes.
Hi, I'm Inga
For over a decade, I've supported leaders working in fast-changing and demanding contexts. My background is in leadership development, process facilitation, and coaching. I help leaders and teams slow down at critical moments to build awareness of what's driving behaviour and dynamics — so they can respond with intention and steadiness, rather than react. That supports clearer decisions, stronger relationships, and more sustainable performance over time.
I bring a systems-aware, trauma-informed lens to my work, paying close attention to context, power dynamics, and the emotional realities people navigate. I'm a Professional Certified Coach (PCC) and Team Coach (ACTC) with the International Coaching Federation, and an experienced facilitator — known for creating spaces where people can think together, work through tension, and move forward with clarity.
Through coaching, facilitation, and practical skill-building, I help teams strengthen how they think, decide, and lead together. Teams I work with typically gain:
Where to start
Every team and context is different. These starting points are designed for different moments. Not sure which fits? Start with a conversation, and we'll figure it out together.
When you want to see your team's strengths & blind spots
A light-touch diagnostic that helps leaders understand what's helping — and hindering — their team. Useful during growth, transition, or after a shift in roles, when the team senses something has changed but hasn't yet named it.
Typical outcomes
When decisions are stalling
When decisions keep getting revisited, ownership is unclear, or follow-through breaks down, this gets to the root of it. Not new frameworks — facilitated conversation inside a live meeting, working with your team's real decisions and priorities.
Format
When you want to experience the work first
Sometimes the best way to know if something's worth investing in is to try it. I join one of your existing team meetings as a coach and observer — I don't run it, you do. I notice what's helping and what's getting in the way, and coach in the moment where it's useful.
Includes
When pressure is high, and support is needed now
Some moments call for immediate, focused support — not a program, just steady, skilled presence alongside the leader and team when it matters most. Blends leadership coaching with facilitation inside real team meetings.
Format
When a team needs more than a focused starting point, longer arcs of coaching and facilitation meet you where the work is.
Coaching alongside your team during real meetings and working sessions — typically over a 4–8 month arc.
Holding the conversations that matter most, through skilled, neutral facilitation.
Building practical skills for working together well under pressure.
For teams working across boundaries, roles, and organizations.
Space for reflection, alignment, and renewed direction.
Supporting leaders to develop inner capacity and outer effectiveness.
Social impact & low bono
For social-impact organizations, nonprofits, climate initiatives, community-resilience collaboratives, and Indigenous-led work — professional team coaching and facilitation at a reduced, flexible investment level, with clearly defined scope and transparent pricing.
$1,500 – $4,500 CAD
A limited number of these engagements are available each year.
In practice
At Royal Roads University, I design and facilitate experiential leadership and teamwork development, coaching diverse student teams through real moments of tension, uncertainty, and decision-making — so they leave more confident, connected, and equipped to work well together under pressure.
Alongside an Indigenous leadership team on an initiative connected to sovereignty and community well-being, we worked in a high-pressure environment with many stakeholders and deep historical and relational layers. Through trauma-aware, culturally respectful practices, we created space for reflection, honest conversation, and thoughtful pacing — supporting values-aligned decisions made together.
"Inga is a clear and authentic facilitator who creates the conditions for teams to engage in deep inquiry together. She held space for honest reflection and shared understanding."
J. McDonald — Master's Student, Royal Roads University"I'm sincerely grateful for Inga's support, guidance, and encouragement. Her insights and coaching have had a meaningful impact on both my personal and professional growth."
M. Dent — Manager, Law Clerk, CartaAbout Inga
The pace of change right now isn't like the last one. Leaders who built their careers on judgment, pattern recognition, and knowing their industry cold are suddenly being told that none of it may be enough on its own.
Some meet that with curiosity. Most also feel a quieter version of the same question: am I still the right person to lead this — or am I about to be out of step with something I can't quite see yet?
I've spent fifteen-plus years working with leaders on exactly that question, across very different settings — from Fortune 500 companies to my own coffee shop. I hold an ICF Professional Certified Coach credential and a Bachelor of Commerce. What I've learned across that range is the same thing every time: strategy isn't what carries people through rapid change. The mindset shift underneath it is — and it's usually the part nobody budgets time for.
If you lead a team, they'll have opinions about what's changing whether you ask or not — some about their jobs, some about whether they trust what's being decided for them. If the call is yours alone, that weight sits squarely on your shoulders. Either way, I work on that part: not the technical build, but the place where you and your team actually believe in what's changing.
This isn't work you finish. The world keeps moving, and the real skill is staying curious and adaptable as it does — without losing sight of what you value and why you're doing any of this in the first place. That's not a course you complete. It's a conversation, and we have it for as long as it's useful.
The foundation for engagement, creativity, and responsibility — in relationships and in how a team collaborates.
Choosing how to show up with honesty, vulnerability, and clarity, rather than blame.
Staying open to notice, listen, and explore — rather than assume or defend.
Outside of work, you'll find me walking, biking, and dancing around Victoria, BC; spending time with my partner and two adult sons; and travelling regularly to Germany. Nature and movement are how I think and recharge.
Start a conversation
If you're navigating complexity, change, or an important moment for your team, you're welcome to reach out. Share a bit about what's on your mind, and we'll explore together whether this support might help.
Book a conversation Email Michael Call 778‑985‑OPEN (6736)
The first conversation is free and commits you to nothing.