Gregory Pal
Studied at Harvard Business School
Works at Mainspring Energy
Available Friday at 1:00 AM UTC
I have a demanding full-time job but I selectively work with people in my off-hours where I feel like I can really move the needle for them.
Questions? Start chatting with this coach before you get started.
About Gregory
I help high achievers become exceptional leaders and perform at their best. Over the past 25+ years, I've led teams, products, and strategic initiatives across technology and energy companies, and today I serve as VP of Product at Mainspring Energy, where I work at the intersection of business strategy, product development, organizational leadership, and executive decision-making. Throughout my career, I've hired, mentored, and coached leaders at every stage from high-potential individual contributors preparing for their first leadership role to experienced executives navigating complex organizational challenges. In the last few years, I also became an ICF-certified coach. My coaching combines practical leadership experience with a deep focus on personal performance. I'm passionate about helping people develop greater clarity, confidence, resilience, and influence so they can lead more effectively, accelerate their careers, and achieve meaningful goals. Whether you're navigating a promotion, managing difficult stakeholders, building a high-performing team, improving executive presence, or figuring out what comes next in your career, I bring a thoughtful, candid, and results-oriented approach. Outside of work, I'm an endurance athlete, marathoner, and performance enthusiast who believes that many of the same principles that drive success in sports - discipline, mental toughness, self-awareness, and consistent execution - also drive success in leadership and life. My goal is to help clients unlock their potential, tackle challenges with confidence, and become the kind of leader others want to follow.
Why do I coach?
I coach because I've been personally fortunate in many ways and because I've always found deep fulfillment in helping others grow. Throughout my life and career, I've had opportunities that shaped who I am today - from studying at MIT and Harvard Business School to working alongside exceptionally talented people across a variety of industries, functions, and leadership roles. Along the way, I've learned lessons about leadership, career growth, communication, resilience, and performance that took decades to accumulate. I've also been passionate about mentoring and developing people for most of my career. Some of the most meaningful moments as a leader have come from helping someone earn a promotion, navigate a difficult challenge, build confidence, or discover potential they didn't realize they had. Watching people grow and succeed has always been one of the most rewarding parts of my work. I've also experienced firsthand the power of coaching. In my own health and fitness journey, working with a great coach helped me achieve results that I never would have reached on my own. That experience reinforced something I had already seen throughout my career: the right coach can accelerate growth, provide perspective, challenge limiting beliefs, and help people achieve more than they thought possible. Coaching is my way of paying that forward. I genuinely enjoy helping people navigate challenges, unlock potential, and achieve goals that matter to them. Whether it's advancing in their career, becoming a more effective leader, building confidence, or performing at a higher level, I find it incredibly rewarding to help others shorten the learning curve and achieve more than they thought possible.
Work Experience
VP of Product
Mainspring Energy
September 2021 - Present
Driven by its mission to advance global access to low-carbon, dispatchable energy, Mainspring has developed a new category of power generation — the linear generator — that delivers onsite, 24/7, fuel-flexible power at a lower cost than the electric grid. To learn more visit www.mainspringenergy.com.
Co-Founder and Chief Business Officer
automat.ai
June 2016 - August 2021
Responsible for all commercial activity and financial management for a Conversational AI company with a vision of scaling human expertise. Executed strategic pivot from our initial focus on messaging applications and chatbots to website personalization for e-commerce companies with a value proposition of driving both immediate revenue growth from increased conversion and AOV and long-term revenue growth from zero-party data.
Vice President, Marketing, Strategy & Business Development, Enterprise Division
Nuance Communications
December 2012 - June 2016
Right-hand person to divisional EVP/GM, responsible for transforming 1000+ employee, $300M+ revenue, global division of publicly traded company and driving revenue, bookings, and profit growth via new strategic direction focused on multi-channel intelligent self-service solutions powered by artificial intelligence. Aligned strategic acquisitions, investment decisions, go-to-market, and day-to-day execution with that strategy - ultimately contributing to a ~5x increase in market cap for the company as a whole and an acquisition by Microsoft for $19.7B.
Senior Director, Strategy & Marketing
OPOWER
April 2011 - December 2012
Responsible for all product marketing functions for the company, including understanding market needs, product strategy, solutions marketing, competitive analysis, pricing, sales enablement, go-to-market strategy, etc. Heavy collaboration with all other functions within the company, including executive management team, product management, enginneering, sales, account management, etc.
Education
Harvard Business School
MBA, Business Administration
1998 - 2000
Activities and societies: Harbus Author of weekly, syndicated column for school newspaper called Paths to Entrepreneurship, interviewing 33 entrepreneurs regarding the complexities of the startup process.
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
BS, EECS
1992 - 1996
Activities and societies: Kappa Sigma Conducted research at the Microsystems Technology Lab on computer-aided design program for MEMS (ultimately licensed to Coventor) and at the Center for Coordination Science on business-process modeling and analysis tools.
1 Review
Overall Rating