Meet Dr. Liz Pavese
Dr. Liz Pavese is an executive coach, organizational psychologist, and the founder of Pavese Insights Lab—a coaching practice and advisory firm dedicated to helping founders scale their leadership, not just their companies and women leaders to lead with clarity and confidence, on their terms.
With over 17 years of experience in enterprise tech, startups, and advisory services, Liz blends behavioral science, product fluency, and human-centered leadership expertise into every engagement. She’s held leadership roles at Workday, CoachHub, Limeade, and Qualtrics, where she shaped strategy and guided product strategy. As a former talent consultant and practitioner, her work centered on designing talent leadership development solutions grounded in evidence-based practice.
Liz knows the realities of leading in high-pressure, high growth environments, and in male-dominated industries and teams. She knows the challenges founders face in scale-ups, making critical hires, becoming leaders or peers, and the courage it takes for women to challenge outdated models of success. Her coaching is equal parts strategic and deeply personal: creating a safe but challenging space where founders don’t feel isolated and women can question old narratives.
As a credentialed ICF coach with a Ph.D. in Industrial/Organizational Psychology, she’s partnered with leaders across sectors, from Fortune 500 executives to early-stage founders. She serves on advisory boards for tech startups and mission-driven organizations, helping shape the future of work and leadership development.
A sought-after speaker, Liz has delivered keynotes and panels at global events including ATD, SHRM, SIOP, and Workday Rising. Her thought leadership has been featured in SHRM, Fast Company, HR.com, Training Industry, and more—and she is a contributing author to The Coaching Buyer’s Handbook and The Ethical Coaches Handbook.
Her mission: To redefine how founders are backed—shifting from product-only bets to investing in their capacity to lead, and thrive which determines whether startups scale or stall.
Ready to change the rules and lead with greater clarity?
You don’t have to figure it out alone. Let’s find that clarity and momentum together.
What people are saying
We asked Liz to deliver a webinar on empathy for our international education community. The webinar was engaging, full of sharp approaches for people to take away and underpinned by research. The feedback from our community was excellent with educational leaders actively applying approaches in their settings.
- Nickolas McKie, Director, PersYou
Liz, thank you for creating and facilitating our 3 day product leadership offsite. You led us through some great activities that engaged the team in great conversations and we left each day feeling a sense of progress and alignment. Your ability to let conversations flow, and intervene or provide direction at the right time is a superpower!
Thank you so much for the thoughtful approach to the product strategy framework you co-created and leading us in the strategy formation process which we are currently following. This will give us the vision and strategic objectives to guide our next set of investments.
- Ciaran H., VP, Product Management