Carmen MacDougall
Carmen truly understands the VA industry all round and is extremely passionate about it. She is more than a coach and trainer, she is a real part of what she delivers and is highly enthusiastic about the support she provides.
She is considered as one of the industry’s leading authorities on what it takes to be a remarkable VA.
Penny Power, Co-Founder of Ecademy.com:
"What a tremendous lady. Committed to the VA Industry and to VA's in a way I have not experienced. So professional, so full of passion and a unique desire to help VA's achieve their business goals and for their customers to be serviced professionally, thank you Carmen, great getting to know you."
Biography
Carmen MacDougall is the Founder and Managing Director of cma coaching and training (CMA) and The Virtual Assistant Coaching and Training Company (VACT).
She is internationally recognised as a leading qualified NLP business coach and trainer for the virtual assistant industry in the UK, Europe and Australia and has a highly successful track record in helping others to follow their own entrepreneurial spirit. She is also a NLP coach and trainer in Corporate Leadership Development, Confidence and Personal Development as well as a regularly sought after motivational speaker having spoken for the likes of the London Speaker Bureau and now presenting for her 8th visit at The Times Creme (www.thetimescreme.co.uk).
Prior to establishing CMA and VACT, Carmen excelled as a PA and office manager for over 15 years within Fortune 500 companies, based in the City of London. Within three months of redundancy, Carmen had taken the plunge and created her own business, as a virtual assistant, building a thriving full-time business with 7 clients rising to 28 in less than a year, working mainly with life coaches and those in the personal and professional development industries, she then developed a team of VAs to support her clients.
A leader and innovator in the VA field, Carmen has made the Virtual Assistant Coaching & Training company the premier provider and is seen as the original and market-leading VA coaching & training resource since its inception in 1999.
Carmen has trained, and coached up to 750 VAs which include some of the industry’s top VAs – two of whom were voted, by an independent judging panel, to be the country's Outstanding VAs of the Year 2007 (in the 2 award categories) plus 2 runners up and several finalists at the National VA Conference and Awards.
The National VA Conference and Awards, which was launched in April 2007, was born from Carmen's realisation that it was time VAs were recognised and praised for their amazing efforts towards their industry and founded, and is now President of the first event of its kind now in its second successful year.
However, Carmen found herself being so inspired by the very coaches she was supporting, and having taken on a coach herself, she knew that her true life’s purpose was to enter the coaching world for herself , hence cma coaching & training was born. She has since devoted much of her career to expanding her professional development as a business and life coach, studying and then becoming a respected Neuro Linguistic Programming (NLP) practitioner and trainer.
By fully employing her coaching skills and her passion in supporting people to move beyond what they would ever have imagined possible, Carmen’s clients find her truly inspiring and motivating as they experience achieving their life-long dreams or breaking through their personal or business barriers.
“Carmen's listening skills, coupled with her professionalism and sound advice, have equipped me with the confidence I needed to proceed with my venture. Anyone requiring a guiding hand in their business would certainly benefit from Carmen's expertise - it was a pleasure listening to the ideas she had to share and I have no hesitation in recommending her.” S. Jalovaara.
Using her tools as a motivational and professional development speaker and trainer, and working closely with EUMA, Carmen works with people from PA to Manager, to sharpen their confidence, create the mindset to achieve their wildest potential or make the effective transition into a management role.
Having established herself as an expert in the VA coaching field, Carmen has been invited to work with the International Association of Virtual Assistants (IAVA) as their official VA Business Coach & Trainer.
She is truly a passionate pioneer for the VA industry and has just successfully launched the UK’s first ever National Virtual Assistant Conference & Awards Ceremony, which took place in Milton Keynes on 21st April 2007. She also launched her “What It Takes to be a Remarkable VA” at the beginning of 2007 and co-founded The VA Times, the premier online publication exclusively for the virtual assistance industry.
