Heather Sansom, MA, PhD
Consultant & Coach,
Researcher, Writer, Speaker

Professional Certifications:
Personal Fitness Trainer,
Riding Coach (EC, NCCP, Centered Riding)
Life Coach (Coach's Federation)
Hike Leader (Hike Ontario)
Cognitive Behavioural Therapy



Recent Roles:
Coach
(www.equifitt.com, www.moveyourmind.ca )
Recreation Therapist,
(Royal Ottawa Mental Health,Intern)
Interim Executive Director
(Serena Canada- charity sector)





Link to Consulting Page to Download Heather's Resume

About Heather

I am all about promoting health and better performance, personally and professionally.  Performance can mean sport, living the life you want to live, or for an organization, aligning process to achieve important goals.  Stephen Covey was fairly accurate when he built a time management system around the idea that the most important activities are often the ones that slide into the margins, overtaken by the urgent and busy.

At both the personal and organizational level, performance means having clear goals, and the right environment and structures to support achieving them. It also means sustainability: wellbeing for people, and connection to mission for organizations; aiming high and taking the long term view. 

In my professional career, I developed an ability for finding and analysing gaps, identifying next step priorities, and then seeing increased performance or growth happen whether that was corporate sales, national programs in a non-profit organization, or athlete performance.  That mental habit worked for me in my corporate sales and marketing career, business consulting, entrepreneurship, management of national athlete development and coach training programs and pilot projects, work with non-profit organizations, and working with people directly as a coach.  

Analysing performance, identifying low-hanging fruits, gap analysis, team building.  Whatever you want to call it, I think of it all as coaching and facilitating groups, organizations or individuals to go from where they are, to the goal they want.  Sometimes, it also means helping people identify the goal.  Usually, moving forward involves making sure you have information you can use. I strongly believe also that we are most effective when our goals align with our values and mission, as individuals and organizations.

Along the way, I became a writer and speaker.  I have written a couple hundred magazine columns, six ebooks and have a book on anatomy and conditioning in the editing phase with a publisher.  I've edited dozens of marketing, training and educational documents and manuals, and spoken at national and international conferences.  Why? Because an idea is powerless unless it is shared.  I love being part of giving people information they can use to make change or help others.

With my return to school after a 20 year career in business and sport, I am retraining to be able to conduct research, tell stories and share information that makes a difference.  There is an overwhelming level of information out there.  I help find and synthesize the relevant pieces, to solve problems.  I especially enjoy working on questions related to sport and recreation, health promotion and wellbeing, using qualitative inquiry to dig under the superficial.  Link to my research information page.

While there is a very thin line between pleasure and work for me, I do have recreation not tied directly to my professional life as well. In my personal life I keep fit (mostly outdoors), sharpen my brain and broaden perspective with language (French, German and Spanish) and the arts (galleries, painting, theatre, ballroom and swing dance), and look for ways to contribute in community.  I have been a Director on the Board for Habitat for Humanity, run an art exhibit in awareness of rural housing issues, led meditational hikes for a social group and volunteered in other ways as I am able.  I make time to recharge in the mountains, at a wine tasting, and having a great conversation with good friends. Balance is not a state, but a constant adjustment of living fully in body, mind, soul, heart.