Anna sums it up - the bwomen community is a group of strong female personalities with exciting and diversified backgrounds. The long-standing entrepreneur and executive coach can definitely count herself among them. Her life is such a multi-faceted one that I cannot summarize in two sentences but leave it to you to read her fascinating story.

Who is Anna Sagalova?
I am someone who simultaneously lives multiple identities as, I guess, we all do in the bwomen community. For my 18-years daughter I am a loving mom and sometimes a “please don’t be a coach with me” coach.

For my clients and business partners I am a change consultant, executive and team coach and a “partner in the entrepreneurial adventure”. Clients often call me “change guide” or a “sparring partner”. For my EMBA students, I am a lecturer on cross-cultural adaptation and change management. For the start-ups in the Swiss entrepreneurial ecosystem I am a coach and mentor.

By academic training I am an economist, change consultant and psychologist. At the core I am a ‘helper’ and a ‘giver’. I enjoy the most helping people to help themselves to grow and feel more in tune with themselves and their environment.

That is my current professional identity that I am living in the last 12 years. And it is the 3rd one since I started my career when I was 19-teen.

Prior to pivoting my career to organizational and leadership development and co-founding the leadership advisory practice APiC Partners in Change, I had a fulfilling corporate career with global financial institutions. Working as a Chief Risk Officer and Board Member at ABN AMRO Bank Russia, IB Director at ABN AMRO Rothschild and the Royal Bank of Scotland where we worked with business owners and executive teams on international IPOs and private placements.

I am Russian-Bulgarian who grew up in Moscow, worked in UK and Netherlands and for the last 7 years lives in beautiful Zürich, having been the initiator of the family relocation to Switzerland.

Besides my family and my profession, I enjoy modern dance, visual arts, yoga and neuroscience – all of these interests have direct impact on my live and the way I work – with holistic approach in mind.

Who or what has strongly influenced your professional career?
People, life circumstances and books. I had luck to meet and to attract people who believed in my abilities and supported my life choices, in first instance, my husband, family and friends.

My mother and my two grandmothers had strong influence – as role models - on my professional choices and on my formation as a woman. My mother and the Russian grandmother taught me to be feminine (and always remain, no matter what life circumstances) and devote myself to family along with the professional career. The Bulgarian grandmother was a renown historian, scientist and a warrior for the country freedom. I think she taught me perseverance, achievement and ability to preserve strong inner compass.

And at present my daughter is one of my best teachers😀

“Man’s search for meaning” by Viktor Frankl was the book that had a big impact on me, also professionally.

Why are you a member of bwomen?
When I heard from Claudia about bwomen and the idea behind the community, I thought I would like to belong here. So far, we mostly met online and nevertheless this community feels as a place where one can grow through sharing knowledge, stories, through feeling empowered by the sense of connection and ‘sisterhood’. There are not many women communities that have such level of substance and that atmosphere. Big appreciation to the founders, the team for the ability to create the space that attracts interesting, amazing, strong women and for the work you do for bringing us together and maintaining the quality of this space. I look forward to our live meetings.

On which topics can other members contact you and where?
I welcome any opportunity for a one-on-one connection with our community members. The topics I help with professionally:

• Support with individual or organizational change and transition
• Clarifying purpose & life alignment
• Career development or career reinvention
• Holistic wellbeing, preventing or overcoming burn-out
• Developing skills for leading self and others
• Teams systemic development
• Organization culture, people and health development

Contact details:  anna.sagalova@partnersinchange.ch, LinkedIn, www.partnersinchange.ch, www.careermasters.net