the real work of leadership
One program. One moment in the leadership journey. built from over 20 years of doing this work for real.
Whether you’re building your path to leadership or navigating your first months in the seat — there is a program built for exactly where you are right now. Both are live, founder-led, and designed to give you what most leadership programs never do: honest, operator-level guidance from someone who has been in every room you’re trying to get into.
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The Real Work of Leadership
For the leader who got the promotion, then found a completely different room than the one they expected.
Getting promoted was the goal. Then you walked through the door and realized the job looks nothing like you imagined. The skills that made you exceptional as an individual contributor are not the same skills that make you effective as a leader, and almost no one tells you that before it’s too late.
The Real Work of Leadership is a nine-week live program for revenue leaders who want to get it right, not just survive the day-to-day. Over seven live, virtual sessions facilitated directly by Elisa Hawkins, you will rewire how you lead, build the operating rhythm your team needs, and develop the strategic communication and influence skills that define credible, lasting leadership.
This is not a generic leadership course dressed up for sales. Every session is built around the specific realities of leading a revenue team — from someone who has led them at every level for over 20 years.
What you walk away with:
You’ll leave The Real Work of Leadership™ with more than leadership theory. You’ll have the confidence, judgment, and practical tools to handle the moments that make leadership hard — difficult conversations, competing priorities, organizational change, accountability, influence, and leading people through uncertainty.
Most importantly, you’ll develop a clearer understanding of how you lead: how to listen before assuming, understand the humans behind the work, make better decisions, hold people accountable without losing empathy, and create the trust and clarity your team needs from you.
You won’t just know more about leadership. You’ll be better prepared to actually lead.
Format: Live | Virtual
Length: 7 Live Sessions | 9 Weeks
Cohort Dates: October 8th - December 3rd, 2026
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Seven courses. Built for right now.
01 — The Leadership Identity Shift
Leadership begins with an identity shift, not a title. Learn how to move from being recognized for your own performance to becoming the leader your team, peers, and executives trust to drive results through others.
02 — Building High-Trust, High-Accountability Teams
Leaders are navigating low trust, fatigue, retention pressure, and performance expectations while often treating empathy and accountability as competing choices. You will learn to understand what is happening with your people, create trust, and hold clear standards without losing the human element.
03 — The Conversations Leaders Can’t Avoid
Leaders frequently delay difficult conversations or over-prepare what they want to say without preparing themselves to hear the other person. You can have the hard conversation, listen without losing clarity, and respond with both humanity and accountability.
04 — Thinking Like An Executive
Managers are often taught to manage work without being taught how to interpret the business, make trade-offs, exercise judgment, or understand the human consequences of business decisions. This course changes that. You can exercise business judgment while understanding how decisions will be experienced and executed by people.
05 — Leading Through Uncertainty & Change
Leaders are expected to create clarity amid AI disruption, restructuring, shifting priorities, economic pressures, and decisions they may not control or agree with. After this course, you will be able to create clarity without pretending certainty exists, and lead people through change by understanding what the change means to them.
06 — Leading Across, Up & Through the Organization
Leadership extends beyond your team. Learn how to communicate with confidence, influence without authority, and build credibility with executives, peers, and key stakeholders.
07 - The Leadership Operating System
Many leaders spend their days in meetings, messages, approvals, and emergencies - and their formal leadership rhythms become status-management mechanisms rather than opportunities to understand and develop people. Here you will develop a repeatable system that protects time for execution, judgment, strategy development, and genuine human connection.
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Everything you need to lead well — not just get through the day.
Seven Live Sessions, Elisa-Led
Seven weekly sessions, 90 minutes each — facilitated directly by Elisa Hawkins, not a contractor, not a curriculum handed off. Every session is built from over 20 years of revenue leadership experience and designed to give you the practical tools, frameworks, and honest perspective that new leaders almost never get access to.
2 Private 1:1’s With Elisa
Two private 30-minute sessions with Elisa, focused entirely on your specific situation and challenges. Not generic advice. A direct, tactical conversation with someone who has been in your seat — and can tell you exactly what she would do.
Peer Pods
You will be matched with another Real Work of Leadership participant for biweekly structured accountability sessions throughout the program. Agenda and prompts provided. The leaders you meet in this room will be some of the most important relationships of your career.
Session Recordings
Every session recording is available unlimited so you can revisit what you need, when you need it — because leading a team in real time doesn’t always leave room to absorb everything in the moment.
30-Day Post-Program 1:1
One month after the program ends, Elisa checks back in personally. Because the first 90 days of leadership don’t stop when the program does — and you deserve continued support as you put everything into practice.
Private Online Community
Access to a private online community for the duration of the program and beyond. A space to ask questions, process challenges, and stay connected to the people who are navigating this transition alongside you.
Weekly Office Hours
We will hold office hours throughout the leadership development series to answer any questions and discuss challenges and wins. Whatever is on your mind!
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The rewire every leader needs.
Where you are now:
Defaulting to seller instincts in a leadership role
Managing by doing instead of leading by developing
Reactive — no operating rhythm yet
Unsure how to communicate upward as a leader
Feeling like an imposter in the room
Where you’ll be:
Leading with a clear identity and authority
Building a team that performs without you doing it for them
Running a consistent, intentional leadership rhythm
Communicating strategically with executives and peers
Owning the room — because you’ve done the real work
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Over 20 years of revenue leadership. Now working for you.
She’s not a coach who learned leadership from a book. She’s an executive who has lived it — made the mistakes and built the frameworks that actually work.
Elisa Hawkins spent over 20 years inside revenue organizations — building teams, fixing broken orgs, and leading sales organizations responsible for growth across Fortune 500 companies and growth-stage startups. She made the exact transition you’re navigating right now — from top performer to leader accountable for others’ results — in some of the most competitive B2B environments in the country.
She has watched the transition from top performer to effective leader break some of the best revenue people she’s ever managed. The Real Work of Leadership exists because almost no one gets real help making it, and that has to change.
She made this transition herself. From carrying a quota to leading the team — she navigated every stage of the revenue leadership journey in real organizations, under real pressure.
Every session is Elisa-led. Not a curriculum handed to a contractor. Every framework, every piece of feedback comes directly from operator experience.
Built for revenue specifically. Not a generic leadership program dressed up for sales. Every session is designed around the realities of revenue organizations.
Private 1:1 with Elisa. Cohort members: two private one-hour sessions with Elisa — focused entirely on your specific situation and challenges.
Elisa Hawkins — Founder, Her Revenue
Former VP of Sales · Over 20 Years Operator Experience · Fortune 500 to Growth-Stage
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$1,795
All 7 courses, live, with the same cohort from start to finish. Includes your private 1:1s with Elisa, peer pod matching, session recordings, online community access, a 30-day post-program check-in, and lifetime access to all recordings and workbooks.
From the women who have worked with Elisa
Not sure which program is right for you? Contact us today!
No spam. No pressure. Just a brief chat with Elisa to discuss where you are now and where you want to go!