Carla Villanueva-Manas is more than just a coach—she’s a trailblazer shaping the future of leadership. As an Executive Coach, Master Trainer, and Leadership Development Advocate, Carla has left an indelible mark by empowering top-tier executives and fellow coaches alike. Her accolades, including being named Best APAC Coach (Gold) in 2023, Best APAC Coach (Silver) in 2022, and Best Executive Coach in 2021, reflect her ability to turn visionaries into game-changers.
With over three decades of business leadership experience—including senior roles at CNN Philippines and SKYcable—Carla draws on a wealth of expertise to help her clients navigate challenges, build resilience, and drive lasting transformation. Through her CoachesCare® initiative, she extends her mission even further, offering free or subsidized coaching to underserved communities, including doctors, teachers, students, and community leaders, creating a ripple effect of empowerment and transformation.
In this interview, we explore Carla’s journey, her philosophy on leadership, and the wisdom she has gained while coaching some of the brightest minds across industries.
- You’ve coached visionary leaders across industries. In your experience, what separates good leaders from truly transformative ones, and how do you guide clients to make that leap?
Good leaders get results—but truly transformative leaders go further; they create legacies. They don’t just achieve goals; they inspire innovation, elevate their teams, and empower others to reach their fullest potential. Transformative leaders foster environments where creativity thrives, challenges are embraced, and people are motivated to think bigger and accomplish more. This legacy-building mindset multiplies their impact far beyond immediate goals, reshaping how organizations and industries approach leadership.
The leap from being a good leader to a transformative one lies in their ability to reshape mindsets, inspire innovation, and drive meaningful change. They don’t just solve problems—they redefine how challenges are approached, shifting perspectives and inspiring others to think and act with greater vision. Transformative leaders create cultures of growth, where people feel empowered to embrace challenges and achieve their highest potential.
When I coach leaders, my goal is to guide them toward this greater impact. Through customized coaching sessions and proprietary tools, I help leaders develop self-awareness, align their leadership with their core values, and refine their ability to inspire and empower others. Leadership isn’t just about achieving personal success—it’s about creating a legacy of transformation that uplifts everyone around them.
2. As both a “Coach to Leaders” and “Coach to Coaches,” you hold a unique position of influence. How do you tailor your approach when coaching high-performing executives versus mentoring fellow coaches?
Coaching leaders and mentoring coaches are distinct yet interconnected processes, each requiring a tailored approach to empower individuals, inspire teams, and drive meaningful transformation.
The core premise of coaching is rooted in the belief that leaders possess the competence and capacity to uncover their own solutions. This belief shapes my approach, which focuses on empowering leaders to harness their inherent potential by optimizing their strengths, pushing boundaries, and achieving lasting success. Through reflective exploration, I help leaders process insights, examine mental models, and reframe belief systems that may hold them back. This process of self-awareness unlocks new perspectives and innovative thinking, enabling them to achieve their goals, foster sustainable growth, and build a legacy of empowered and inspired teams.
For coaches, I take on the role of teacher, mentor, and sometimes coach, with a focus on capacity-building. I equip them with the tools, methodologies, best practices, and feedback they need to become great coaches capable of delivering transformative results. By fostering their self-awareness and deepening their understanding of human behavior, I help coaches develop the mastery required to guide leaders effectively, sparking innovation and driving meaningful change.
The distinction lies in the approach: with leaders, I coach—helping them uncover solutions and perspectives to achieve their goals. With coaches, I teach and mentor—providing the skills, frameworks, and capacity to enable others to do the same. What unites these roles is the ripple effect: leaders inspire and empower others within their organizations, while coaches amplify this transformation, extending it across industries and communities. Together, this alignment creates exponential growth, lasting change, and collective progress.
3. Your extensive leadership background in C-suite roles must have provided invaluable insights. How have your experiences shaped your coaching methodology?
Having led in high-pressure, high-stakes positions, I’ve experienced the ups and downs of leadership—the successes that build momentum and the mistakes that offer powerful lessons. Coaching isn’t just about theory and skills—it’s about lived experience. My approach is shaped by navigating complexity, making tough decisions, and learning how to empower teams to create their own solutions while fostering innovation and collaboration.
These experiences taught me that leadership is about more than achieving results; it’s about maximizing the potential of both self and others while building cultures of trust, resilience, and growth. This perspective helps me connect deeply with leaders’ realities and guide them in developing strategies that drive sustainable success and lasting impact.
4. CoachesCare® is such an inspiring initiative. What motivated you to launch this project, and what impact have you seen in bringing coaching to underserved communities?
Coaching has always been about creating opportunities for growth. Through CoachesCare®, I aim to find opportunities to make coaching more accessible to underserved communities, ensuring its transformative impact extends beyond corporate spaces to foster stronger communities.
This initiative was born from my belief that leadership and empowerment should not be limited by access. By providing pro bono or subsidized coaching in key areas, CoachesCare® allows individuals, community leaders, and young professionals to benefit from this powerful process. I’ve witnessed people gain clarity in their career paths, overcome significant challenges, and achieve life-changing breakthroughs. One of the most powerful moments is seeing the “aha” realization—the instant someone uncovers a new perspective or solution they hadn’t considered before.
What drives me most are the stories I hear long after these sessions—stories of people overcoming obstacles, finding new opportunities, and paying the lessons forward. CoachesCare® isn’t just about individual growth; it’s about creating ripple effects of empowerment and transformation, finding meaningful ways to bring the benefits of coaching to those who need it most.
5. With over 4,000 hours of professional coaching under your belt, what’s the most surprising lesson you’ve learned about leadership or personal growth from your clients?
The most surprising—and humbling—lesson I’ve learned is that even the most accomplished leaders face self-doubt and uncertainty. No matter how successful they may seem, many question their worth, their decisions, or their ability to lead. As a leader, I’ve felt that myself—those moments of doubt where you wonder if you’re enough or if you’re making the right call. It’s a deeply human experience, and one I can deeply relate to.
That’s why it’s a privilege to create a space where leaders feel safe to confront these doubts, shift their perspective, build capacity, and rediscover their clarity and confidence. Coaching helps them reframe uncertainty as a signal for growth, uncover solutions they didn’t see before, and lead with greater authenticity. It’s incredibly rewarding to support leaders in moving past their self-doubt and stepping fully into their potential, knowing they’ll inspire the same in those they lead.
6. You’ve been recognized with multiple coaching awards, including Best APAC Coach. What’s been your biggest challenge in achieving such high levels of success, and how do you continue to push the boundaries of your work?
One of my biggest challenges has been balancing the drive for excellence with the need for self-care. In striving to deliver the best to my clients, it’s easy to overlook the importance of replenishing myself. I’ve learned that sustainable success requires prioritizing self-care so I can show up as my best self for those I support.
Pushing boundaries means constantly evolving—whether by introducing innovative tools, refining my coaching frameworks, or training and mentoring the next generation of coaches. As part of this effort, I also offer personal scholarship grants to aspiring coaches who are committed to providing pro bono work in underserved communities. By equipping these coaches with the skills, tools, and methodologies to create meaningful impact, I ensure the ripple effect of coaching extends far and wide, amplifying transformation across industries and communities.
It also means expanding initiatives like CoachesCare®, which aim to make coaching more accessible to underserved communities. Success, to me, isn’t about recognition—it’s about creating breakthroughs for others, helping them grow as leaders, and inspiring positive change that resonates far beyond the individual.
