James Flaherty, MCC, is the founder of New Ventures West, co-founder of Integral Leadership, and the author of Coaching: Evoking Excellence in Others, Second Edition, which Peter Senge claimed "will come to stand out as a definitive work" in the field.

James designed the Professional Coaching Course and dozens of other programs, and he leads classes throughout North America, South Africa and Europe. He has coached top executives at many Fortune 500 companies and is a highly sought speaker at meetings and conferences.

Over the past two decades, James has led coaching and leadership courses involving thousands of people. He has developed New Ventures West's approach to coaching by integrating recent discoveries in linguistics, developmental psychology, twentieth-century philosophy, and biology into the practical and customized methodology known as Integral Coaching. James was educated at the University of California in psychology and literature. He is currently writing a second book entitled Integral Coaching.

James lives in San Francisco with his wife and has a daughter he adores. In addition to being a voracious reader, he practices yoga and weightlifting. He owns a large collection of CDs, mostly in the classic, rock, and jazz genres. He is a Zen student, studying with Norman Fischer of Everyday Zen. He enjoys travel and likes to spend time with his daughter and her friends.