Today we’d like to introduce you to Dr. Nichole Moore.
Hi Dr. Nichole, it’s an honor to have you on the platform. Thanks for taking the time to share your story with us – to start maybe you can share some of your backstory with our readers?
I sometimes laugh when I think about how my career started because I grew up surrounded by educators. I was absolutely certain I would never become one! Education was everywhere in my family. I grew up around the lesson planning, the grading, the meetings, and, of course, the educator stories that somehow always found their way to the dinner table. And I thought, “Absolutely not. That will not be my life.” I was going to do something completely different.
Well…apparently I should have been a little less confident about that decision. What I didn’t understand then was that sometimes the very thing you spend years saying you’ll never do turns out to be exactly where you discover your calling and purpose. Education didn’t just become my career; it became the place where I found the work I believe I was meant to do.
I eventually found my way into special education and started my career teaching students who were deaf and hard of hearing. My first classroom was full of boys, and when I say they brought energy into that room, they brought ENERGY! They kept me laughing, thinking, adjusting, and, on particularly lively days, probably questioning whether I knew what I was doing. But I loved that classroom! I loved their personalities, their humor, and the challenge of figuring out what each student needed in order to be successful.
That experience changed me.
I discovered that I had a particular passion for working with students who didn’t always fit neatly into traditional ways of teaching and learning—the students whom others sometimes struggled to reach, but who often had so much to offer when given the right opportunities to show it. I loved figuring out what made them light up, what helped them connect, and, just as importantly, what might be getting in the way of their success. I stopped asking, *“Why isn’t this student succeeding?”* and started asking, *“What can we, as the adults around this student, do differently to create a better opportunity for them to succeed?”*
That shift in perspective became one of the earliest lessons that shaped the way I lead today: before we assume something needs to change within the person, we should be willing to examine what may need to change around them.
I didn’t realize it then, but that question would follow me throughout my entire career.
Over the years, my career took me from the classroom to serving as a principal, a director of special education, a district consultant, a state-level coordinator at the department of education, and eventually a university professor and program director preparing aspiring educational leaders. With each new role, my view became a little wider. I went from thinking about what one student needed, to what a classroom needed, to what teachers needed, to what leaders and entire organizations needed in order to be successful.
And I kept seeing a similar pattern: people often don’t need someone to come in and “fix” them. They need the right support, opportunities, expectations, relationships, and environment to grow.
That realization eventually became a major part of the inspiration behind EmpowerEd Educational Consulting Group, LLC™.
Today, I have the privilege of serving as the Founder and CEO of EmpowerEd, an educational consulting firm in Michigan that allows me to bring together so many pieces of my professional journey. Becoming an entrepreneur was another unexpected turn in my story. I didn’t begin my career imagining that one day I would own a consulting firm, but over time, I realized I wanted to take what I had learned across classrooms, schools, districts, higher education, and state-level work and use those experiences to help leaders and organizations in a broader way.
For me, being a Founder and CEO isn’t simply about owning a business. It’s about having the opportunity to build something that reflects what I believe about people, leadership, and change.
Through EmpowerEd, I partner with leaders and organizations to help them become stronger from the inside out. Rather than simply coming in, delivering a training, and leaving, I want our work to help people build the skills, confidence, systems, and ways of working together that continue long after our partnership ends. There is something incredibly rewarding about watching a leader or team realize, “We can do this. We have what we need. We just needed a different way to think about it.”
At the heart of EmpowerEd is a pretty simple belief: when we create better conditions for people, we create better possibilities for results.
When I look back now, I can see how much of what I do today started in that very first classroom. I just didn’t have the language for it yet.
Those energetic boys taught a brand-new teacher that people will often surprise you when you take the time to understand what they need, recognize what they bring to the table, and create an environment where they have a real opportunity to succeed.
That lesson followed me from teacher to principal, from district leadership to state-level work, from professor to now to Founder and CEO. The roles have changed, and the rooms have certainly gotten bigger, but the heart of the work has remained remarkably similar.
So there is definitely some irony in my story. The girl who grew up surrounded by educators and vowed she would never go into education ended up building an entire career, and eventually a business, around helping students, educators, leaders, and organizations grow.
Apparently, education had the last word after all.
We all face challenges, but looking back would you describe it as a relatively smooth road?
I’m not sure there is such a thing as a completely smooth road, especially when you’re building something that matters to you!
One of my biggest challenges was realizing that being good at “the work” and knowing how to run a business are two very different things. I came into entrepreneurship with over 25 years of experience in education, leadership, consulting, coaching, and working with organizations. I knew how to support leaders, facilitate difficult conversations, help teams think differently, and strengthen systems. But suddenly, I also needed to understand marketing, contracts, pricing, business development, branding, finances, technology, and all of the other things that come with being a Founder and CEO.
There were definitely moments when I thought, *“Wait…when exactly was I supposed to learn all of this?”*
Another challenge has been learning to trust my own ideas. When you have spent much of your career working within established organizations and systems, there are structures, processes, and expectations already in place. Even in leadership positions, you often have to ask permission, work through multiple layers of approval, or fit a new idea into an existing structure. There were times when I could see a different way of doing something or wanted to think outside the box, but the system simply wasn’t designed to move in that direction, or at least not as quickly as I wanted it to.
Entrepreneurship turned that completely upside down.
Suddenly, there wasn’t anyone to ask for permission. I was creating the structure. I was making the decisions. I could think outside the box, and, in many cases, I could decide there didn’t need to be a box at all.
That kind of freedom is exciting, but it also comes with responsibility. When you’re the person making the decisions, you also have to be willing to stand behind them. Sometimes you are building something before anyone else can fully see what you see. I’ve had to learn to trust my experience, trust my instincts, and give myself permission to pursue an idea even when there isn’t already a roadmap for it.
That requires a different kind of confidence.
I’ve also had to learn that growth doesn’t always happen as quickly, or as neatly, as we would like. There have been ideas that I was excited about that didn’t take off the way I expected. There have been opportunities that I thought were perfect that didn’t work out, and other opportunities I never anticipated that opened completely new doors. I’ve learned not to view every “no,” delay, or change in direction as failure or denial. Sometimes it is information. Sometimes it is redirection. And sometimes it simply means, not yet.
Perhaps one of the biggest lessons has been learning that I don’t have to do everything myself. That one is still a work in progress! When you care deeply about something you’ve created, it can be difficult to loosen your grip on it. But building something sustainable requires knowing when to bring in other people, when to ask for help, and when someone else’s expertise can make the work stronger.
Ironically, that lesson mirrors what I teach leaders through EmpowerEd. Leadership isn’t about having all the answers or carrying everything yourself. It’s about creating the conditions for other people to contribute, grow, and bring their strengths to the work.
So, no, the road hasn’t always been smooth. But I’m grateful that it hasn’t been. The challenges have forced me to grow not only as an entrepreneur, but also as a leader and as a person. I’ve become more comfortable with uncertainty, more willing to take calculated risks, and much more accepting of the fact that sometimes you figure out the next step by taking it.
I’m still learning. I’m still building. And I think that is part of what makes this chapter of my journey so exciting.
Thanks for sharing that. So, maybe next you can tell us a bit more about your business?
I founded EmpowerEd Educational Consulting Group, LLC™ in 2025, but the work behind it had been taking shape for more than 25 years. Every role I held, from teacher to principal, district and state-level leadership, and higher education, helped shape the ideas and approach that eventually became EmpowerEd.
Today, EmpowerEd is a Michigan-based educational consulting firm that works with schools, organizations, and leaders to help people work better together, strengthen leadership, and improve the systems that support their work.
At its core, our work is really about helping organizations close the gap between what they want to happen and what is actually happening.
Most organizations I work with aren’t struggling because people don’t care or aren’t working hard enough. Usually, it’s quite the opposite. I meet incredibly committed people who are working very hard, sometimes too hard, but they may be working within systems that aren’t giving them what they need to be successful.
Maybe communication isn’t clear. Maybe the same few people are carrying too much of the responsibility. Maybe there has been training, but people still aren’t sure how to put what they’ve learned into practice. Maybe a new program was introduced before anyone stopped to ask whether the organization actually had the time, resources, skills, or support to make it work.
That is where EmpowerEd comes in.
We help leaders develop stronger teams, improve how people work together, solve organizational challenges, and create environments where both people and ideas have a better chance of succeeding. We also have deep expertise in special education and helping schools build stronger systems of support for students with different learning needs.
But regardless of the service, I never want EmpowerEd to be known as the company that simply comes in, gives people another training, hands out a binder, and leaves. Most educators have enough binders!
I want us to be known for helping people actually use what they learn and helping organizations become stronger long after our work together has ended.
One of the things that sets EmpowerEd apart is that we pay attention to both the people and the system around them.
Think about it this way: you can have incredibly talented people working in an environment that makes it difficult for them to succeed. And you can have a beautifully designed plan that goes nowhere because the people responsible for carrying it out don’t have the clarity, confidence, support, or opportunity they need.
You need both.
That is also why so much of our work focuses on helping leaders rethink what leadership looks like. Leaders often feel enormous pressure to have all the answers, solve every problem, and carry everything themselves. We help them shift from being the person who always provides the answer to becoming the person who knows how to bring people together, ask the right questions, develop the strengths of others, and create shared ownership for the work.
I often say that the goal isn’t to make people dependent on EmpowerEd. The goal is to help organizations become stronger because EmpowerEd was there.
That is probably what I am most proud of about the brand.
As EmpowerEd has grown, I’ve been very intentional about creating tools and approaches that reflect that philosophy. We don’t believe in one-size-fits-all solutions. We start by listening. What is working? What isn’t? What do people need? What is getting in their way? And just as importantly, what strengths and resources are already there that we can build upon?
Sometimes an organization doesn’t need another new initiative. Sometimes it needs help making what it already has work better.
And perhaps that is what I most want readers to understand about EmpowerEd: we believe sustainable change happens when you invest in people while also paying attention to the conditions surrounding them.
Interestingly, that takes me right back to where my career began.
As a young special education teacher, I stopped asking only, “Why isn’t this student succeeding?” and started asking, “What can we change around this student to create a better opportunity for success?”
More than 25 years later, I’m still asking that question, just on a much larger scale.
What can we create around people, leaders, and organizations that gives them the opportunity to thrive?
That question has become the heart of EmpowerEd.
What quality or characteristic do you feel is most important to your success?
I would say curiosity.
I’ve always been someone who wants to understand “the why” behind things. If something isn’t working, my first instinct isn’t necessarily to accept that it can’t work. I want to know: Why isn’t it working? What are we missing? What haven’t we considered? Is there another way to look at this?*
Sometimes that means I ask a lot of questions! But I’ve learned that some of the best solutions come from being willing to stay curious a little longer instead of rushing to an answer.
That curiosity has followed me throughout my career. It was there in my first classroom when I stopped asking, “Why isn’t this student succeeding?” and started wondering what we could change around the student. It was there when I became a leader and began looking beyond individual problems to understand what might be happening within the larger organization. And it is certainly there now as an entrepreneur, where almost every day gives me something new to figure out.
Curiosity has also taught me not to assume that because something has always been done a certain way, it has to continue being done that way. I have a natural tendency to look at something and think, “Okay, but what if we tried this?” Sometimes that leads to a great idea. Sometimes it leads to something that absolutely does not work! Both are valuable because both teach me something.
I think curiosity also keeps me humble. No matter how much experience I have, I never want to walk into a room assuming I already know everything I need to know. The people closest to a challenge often know things I don’t. So I listen, I ask questions, and I try to understand before deciding what should happen next.
That has become especially important in my work with EmpowerEd. I don’t want to walk into an organization with a prepackaged answer and say, “Here’s what you need.” I want to understand their people, their strengths, their challenges, and what they have already tried. Then we can figure out what makes sense together.
So, if I had to identify one characteristic that has contributed most to my success, it would be curiosity, the willingness to ask another question, challenge an assumption, learn something new, and remain open to the possibility that there may be a better way.
I think some of the most important moments in my career have started with two very simple words: “What if?”
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