In this Women’s History Month episode of Building People, Companies, and Careers, host Amy Pack sits down with Natalie Copeland, Senior IT Manager at Ingersoll Rand, to discuss leadership, growth, and navigating a career as a woman in technology.
Key Takeaways
Podcast Transcript | Brought to You by AccruePartners
Episode: Women in Leadership, Curiosity, and Taking Chances on Yourself
Key Takeaways
In this International Women's History Month episode, host Amy Pack sits down with Natalie Copeland, Senior Manager in IT and a leader who has built a career defined by curiosity, adaptability, and intentional people development. From Ford Motor Credit to enterprise IT leadership, Natalie shares the mindset shifts and practical lessons that have shaped her. Here is what you will take away:
- Why situational leadership is the most effective development tool available, Natalie credits her growth directly to leaders who adapted their coaching style to the person and the moment rather than applying a one-size-fits-all approach. That same philosophy now shapes how she develops her own teams.
- How to lead with presence before you have all the answers. Owning a seat at the table is not about authority. It is about communicating thoughtfully, being direct and concise, and knowing the three key things you want your audience to understand and act on.
- The secret to building people while still driving results. Understanding what motivates each individual employee, not what motivates you, is what allows leaders to keep people engaged through challenge and change. Directing people toward work they genuinely care about produces better outcomes for everyone.
- The leadership belief Natalie had to unlearn. Leaders do not need to have all the answers. They need to ask the right questions, bring clarity to ambiguous situations, and know where to find the expertise the team needs. That shift takes pressure off the leader and builds trust across the organization.
- Why curiosity is becoming a competitive differentiator. Critical thinking and genuine curiosity are increasingly rare skills in the workforce, particularly among early-career professionals who have always had instant access to information. Natalie uses frameworks like the five whys to actively build that muscle in her teams.
- The bold move that accelerated Natalie's leadership trajectory. Stepping into a large-scale business transformation and application software leadership role forced her to think more strategically about how she communicated at every level of the organization. Learning to adjust the message for the audience was the turning point.
- Why networking is the one investment every early career professional needs to make now.
Not later, not when things settle down. The professionals who build their networks before they need them are the ones who can navigate unexpected career transitions with confidence and momentum
Episode Transcript
Episode Guests & Host
Host: Amy Pack — AccruePartners
Guest: Natalie Copeland — Sr. Manager, IT | Ingersoll Rand
Introduction
Amy Pack: Welcome back to Building People, Companies, and Careers. I'm your host, Amy Pack. At AccruePartners, we partner with organizations during times of growth, change, leadership transition, and transformation here in Charlotte, the Carolinas, and beyond. In honor of International Women's History Month, today's conversation features a woman leader who is shaping organizations, driving impact, and redefining what leadership looks like from the inside out. Natalie, thank you so much for coming into the AccruePartners offices for this conversation. Before we get into our questions, take a moment and tell me a little about yourself.
Natalie Copeland: Thank you so much for having me. When I look back at my 25-plus years in corporate America, it has been a genuinely diverse journey. I started with Ford Motor Credit, collecting on delinquent car loans, and I am now a senior manager in IT with everything in between. I am really excited to share my thoughts on building culture, engaging teams, and encouraging other women to take chances on themselves.
Amy Pack: I love it. And I have to ask quickly since it just came up in conversation before we started: you went to the University of Tennessee for both your undergrad and your master's. Are you from Tennessee originally?
Natalie Copeland: Not at all. I grew up in the suburbs of Detroit, Michigan, hence the Ford connection. But I did not love cold weather, and I wanted a fresh experience somewhere new. My sister had a roommate heading to UT, I went down for a weekend visit, and it just felt like home immediately. Go Vols.
The Experiences That Shaped Natalie Copeland as a Leader
Amy Pack: When you look at your career today, what moment or decision most shaped the leader you have become?
Natalie Copeland: It was genuinely difficult to pinpoint a single moment. For me, it has really been about the ongoing practice of leading, reflecting on the challenges within my teams, and learning to understand different leadership styles. I lean strongly toward situational leadership because it allows me to adapt my coaching and guidance to the specific person and the specific situation they are in. What works for one team member in one scenario will not work for someone else in a different one. Two of the best leaders I have personally had modeled that for me. They challenged me consistently, but they never left me to figure things out alone. When I was navigating new territory, they coached me through it in a way that set me up to succeed rather than just survive.
How Natalie Copeland Approaches Leadership Presence and Communication
Amy Pack: Was there a point when you had to stop waiting for permission to take a seat at the table and simply own it?
Natalie Copeland: I have always been fairly confident and willing to speak up when it matters. For me, the evolution has been less about waiting for permission and more about learning to communicate more thoughtfully and strategically once I am at the table. Over time, I became much more direct and concise, and I developed a discipline around being very intentional about the three key takeaways I want the people in the room to walk away with and act on. That clarity of communication is what I think actually earns sustained influence, much more than simply occupying a seat.
Building People While Driving Results: Understanding What Motivates Each Individual
Amy Pack: How do you think about your responsibility as a leader when it comes to developing people and not just delivering results? Results matter, financial performance matters, but so does growth.
Natalie Copeland: It really comes down to understanding what matters most to each individual employee. Not every person is going to want the same career path I have taken, and not every person is motivated by what motivates me. When you take the time to genuinely understand what drives someone, you can lead them through challenging work and ambitious goals in a way that keeps them empowered and engaged rather than just pressured. It also means being intentional about directing people toward opportunities and projects they actually have heart for. When people care about the work, the results follow naturally.
Amy Pack: That connects to something I talk about often at AccruePartners. You do not necessarily need the title to lead. You can lead through influence. And tying people's intrinsic motivations to the outcomes the organization needs is exactly how that works.
Advice for Women Stepping Into Bigger and More Visible Roles
Amy Pack: What advice would you give to women who are navigating the move into a bigger, more visible leadership role? That can be a genuinely intimidating moment.
Natalie Copeland: It is, and I think doubt in those moments is a very normal human response to increased responsibility. My advice is simply this: take a chance on yourself. Believe in your capability. Lean on your mentors and identify the experts in the room so you can leverage them rather than feeling like you have to compete with them. People sometimes assume that stepping into a leadership role means having all the answers. It does not. It means being able to ask the right questions, bring clarity to the people around you, and know where to find the answers you do not have yet. You also do not need to check every box on the job description before you apply. Be willing to learn. Stay curious. Those qualities will carry you further than any specific credential.
Amy Pack: Curiosity actually comes up a lot in these conversations, and I find it is a skill that trips up some newer professionals, particularly in IT. When information has always been immediately accessible through a device, the muscle for genuine curiosity, for peeling back the layers and asking why, does not always get developed. Do you see that as a challenge in your organization?
Natalie Copeland: Absolutely, and I think it is a widespread challenge, not just in IT. The piece that is often missing is critical thinking. One of the frameworks I rely on heavily, both personally and with my teams, is the five whys. I may not have a formal spreadsheet in front of me, but whenever I am learning a new process, stepping onto a new project, or working through a problem, I am always asking why at every layer. And I actively try to bring my teams into that same discipline rather than just handing them a template to fill out. It is the act of asking why that builds the critical thinking capability over time. I also want to be transparent with my teams about my own limits. I am not a developer. I tell them that directly. But I can take a business process, understand how it flows through a system, and work toward a solution. I find the experts for what I cannot do myself, and I lean on them.
The Leadership Belief That Had to Be Unlearned
Amy Pack: What belief about leadership did you hold early in your career that you have since had to unlearn?
Natalie Copeland: It is the same thing I touched on earlier: the belief that a leader has to have all the answers. When you are early in your career, and you watch senior leaders presenting in town halls with clarity and conviction, it is easy to assume they simply know everything. What you do not see is the team of capable, knowledgeable people behind them who helped surface those answers. The shift I had to make was releasing that pressure from myself, understanding that my job is to ask the right questions, bring clarity when there is none, deploy the right resources at the right time, and leverage the expertise around me. Once I internalized that, leading became significantly less about performing and much more about building.
What Meaningful Success Looks Like Beyond Title and Achievement
Amy Pack: As you look ahead, what does meaningful success look like for you now, beyond title and professional achievement?
Natalie Copeland: For me, it is more personal than professional at this point. I want to give back my learnings through mentoring young women. I currently serve as an advisor for risk management with my sorority's local chapter at UNC Charlotte, and being able to walk alongside those young women as they move through their education and begin building their careers has been genuinely fulfilling. I also want to continue supporting organizations that empower women, whether through networking opportunities, speaking engagements, or simply showing up and being present for those conversations. When I look back at where I started and think about young people today trying to figure out their path, I want to be a resource for them.
Amy Pack: That is so important right now. The entry-level job market is genuinely challenging for young professionals in a way I have not seen before. Internship pipelines have changed, organizations are navigating how to develop talent earlier, and early career professionals are navigating more uncertainty than previous generations faced at the same stage. Your story is actually a great example to share with them. Your undergraduate degree is in psychology. You are now a senior manager in IT. The path is rarely linear.
Natalie Copeland: Exactly right. What I got my degree in is not what I am doing today, and that is fine. Somewhere along the way, technology genuinely captured my interest, and I pursued that curiosity and kept following it as the field evolved. That willingness to take a chance on myself, to stay curious, and to keep learning is what has carried me forward. That is the message I want to pass on.
Rapid Fire Questions
Amy Pack: What is one piece of advice you wish someone had given you ten years earlier in your career?
Natalie Copeland: Network. And not just passively. Take the time in the evenings to attend professional development events, women in manufacturing groups, women in IT gatherings, PMI chapters in your local area. I wish I had done that much earlier. There is so much you can learn from other people's experiences and challenges that you simply cannot get any other way. I know life gets in the way, and I know the pandemic wiped out that muscle for a few years, but building those relationships before you need them is the investment that pays off when things get hard.
Amy Pack: That is so true. At AccruePartners, we kept trying to host events through that period, and it took until late 2024 to really see the energy come back. People wanted to connect, but the habit had changed. Rebuilding it takes real intention. And the professionals who wait until they are in a moment of urgency to start networking find it is a very different experience than building those relationships from a place of genuine connection.
Natalie Copeland: Completely. I see it even in my son, who is wrapping up his junior year of high school. The way his generation organizes socially and communicates with one another is genuinely different. It is something we need to be actively addressing with young people.
Amy Pack: What is one bold move that changed your career trajectory?
Natalie Copeland: Taking on a large-scale business transformation and moving into application software leadership. That experience fundamentally changed how I approach work, how I tackle challenges, and most significantly, how I think about communication. I learned very quickly that how I communicate with one audience is completely different from how I need to communicate with another. Learning to stop and be deliberate about who I am speaking to and what they need to hear from me was the growth that propelled me into the leadership path I am on now.
Amy Pack: And what brought you to Charlotte originally?
Natalie Copeland: Ford Credit, actually. My husband received a job offer here in Charlotte, and when I went to my manager in Houston to let him know, he told me the Charlotte office had an open role. I transferred with Ford Credit in 2000 and have been here ever since, with stops along the way at GE Plastics, Sabic, and then IR. Charlotte has been home for 25 or 26 years now.
Amy Pack: A great journey. Natalie, thank you so much for taking time out of your schedule to sit down with us today. Your story is a reminder that curiosity, adaptability, and the willingness to take a chance on yourself are the foundations of a remarkable career. We appreciate you.
Natalie Copeland: Thank you so much for this opportunity. It has been a pleasure
