Wendy Somers
Director

Wendy is a Director of Newcastle Consulting Group and Catalyst Coaching (the coaching division of Newcastle) focusing on coaching and consulting with clients in both the public and private sector. She also offers a special focus on the area of wine marketing and consulting. She has coached and consulted with many CE's, business owners and director level staff members in many different industries.

She has successfully coached and consulted with numerous diverse clients, business owners, executives and tier 1 and 2 management level staff, frequently coming from a technical, science or IT orientation. Wendy has also worked successfully with many small to medium sized enterprises, including wineries, in New Zealand and the US and has been a very successful serial entrepeneur. She is highly experienced with over 2000 hours of consulting and coaching, for more than 5 years. Common issues are achieving value for money, marketing effectiveness, management challenges, healthy work- life balance, increasing productivity in the work place, time management, increasing team motivation, being a more effective manager, increased job satisfaction, human change management, increasing positive communication, leadership skill development, career path development, team building, conflict resolution,organisational development and design, planning for the sale of the business, problem solving outside of the square, expanding creative thinking, as well as business expansion or re-organisation, marketing and strategy.

In her previous professional career, she was a very successful recruiter with her own recruitment firm specialising in high level financial placements of executives. She then became the creator and Director of an internationally renowned fertility and adoption center, assisting in the creation of hundreds of families for over 12 years. It had one of the world's largest internet-based donor banks.

Wendy is a results-oriented, pragmatic leader with the ability to vision and create new opportunities. She takes great joy in sharing her innate ability to make things happen and to encourage others to move forward to achieve their dreams and objectives. Her personal motto is "Just Do It". As an extremely successful serial entrepreneur for more than 20 years, she has acquired significant business, marketing, conflict management and managerial skills in her tool box. Wendy enjoys integrating these diverse skills into her coaching and consulting practice. She loves to empower her clients to realize their fullest potential, increase productivity by thinking smarter, not working harder, to think outside the square, and achieve a high level of personal and business success.

She has completed extensive coaching coursework and received certification with both Coachville and Coaches Training Institute (CTI) programmes, the most prestigious and renowned hands on coaching schools in the world in 2003. She also completed the rigorous, year-long Leadership Training Program at CTI in 2004 and has thousands of hours of coaching and consulting experience.She is also trained in administering the DISC, a powerful business oriented assessment tool that looks at behavioral styles and preferences and Riso Hudson Enneagram. She is in the process of being accredited by the Leadership Development Centre.

Wendy is the Membership Director for International Coach Federation- Australasia and sits on the board of directors. She also sits on the Board of the Johnsonsville Wine Group. She was the committee Chairperson of the Small Business Committee of the International Coach Federation and hosted their Small Business Special Interest Group (SIG). She was a past Board member for Coaching Kids, Inc., a non-profit organization that focuses on providing coaching for kids in a variety of settings, including prisons, churches and schools.

Wendy has a dual undergraduate degree in psychology and communications from Michigan State University, and a Masters in Organizational Psychology . She has completed post-graduate studies in law, wine studies and change management.

She has a deep passion for the wine industry and focuses part of her consulting and coaching efforts there. She has a comprehensive certificate in wine marketing and consulting from the prestigious University of California at Davis and has numerous contacts throughout the wine industry.

She has been featured on 60 Minutes, Redbook, WIRED, Good Housekeeping, USA TODAY, The Denver Post and The Rocky Mountain News, among numerous other publications, and she has been on a number of USA and international talk and radio shows.

Wendy is an avid student of life, living on the edge and seizing every day with gusto. She is a passionate world traveler who has fearlessly explored the remotest corners of Africa and other parts of the world.

She still manages a large profitable real estate and property rental portfolio with a group of partners in Salt Lake City, Utah while working as a real estate coach and mentor to real estate investors in the USA .

Her personal passions include adventure travel, good wine, great food, skiing, voracious reading, sailing, gardening and calculated risk taking. She is a member of good standing with the International Coach Federation. She volunteers as a business mentor and coach with the Business Mentors New Zealand Mentoring Programme and is a member of the New Zealand Rotary Club and Wellington SLOW FOOD. She volunteers for American Womens Network, Johnsonville Wine Group, SPCA and hosts an active dining out group.