The breakfast table > the boardroom table
When we talk about building BRAVE® leaders, it can sound lofty — like it’s something reserved for boardrooms, strategy sessions, and executive retreats.
But I need you to know:
That’s actually never been the real goal.
It’s never just been about leadership titles, startups, or scale.
It’s been about your leadership around the table — your table.
Because here’s what I know:
The conversations you have at home don’t just shape the leader you are — they shape the leaders you raise.
The resilience built over family meals fuels the results you bring to the world.
The trust cultivated around your table becomes the foundation for the confidence and curiosity of the next generation.
What we practice at home fuels how we show up everywhere else.
A little travel back in time...
You may not know this, but long before BRAVE® was born, there was Caffè Unimatic — my coffee company, and really, my first mission.
Its purpose was simple: Bring Italian values back to the world by bringing the world back to the table — over coffee.
Growing up in an Italian family, so much of life happened at the table.
We didn’t rush through meals.
We talked.
We asked questions.
We listened — even when it wasn’t easy.
And without realizing it, we were practicing BRAVE® long before it had a name.
To be specific, I spent a lot of that time around the table with my Dad.
We’d talk for hours — often long enough that my Mom would come back downstairs ready for lunch… and we hadn’t moved!
Still sipping coffee, still deep in conversation about how to turn an idea into a business, how to think about a challenge, or how to read between the lines of human motivation.
We not only started businesses together — in a very real way, we started BRAVE® together.
Because those conversations changed me.
They gave me my confidence.
They sparked my curiosity.
They made me obsessed with human psychology, motivation, leadership, and brain science — with how stress and the nervous system impact our ability to connect, create, and lead.
From day one, I knew: If I could help recreate that opportunity for other kids and families around the world, I’d have made a kind of positive impact I could be proud of.
My awareness of it started after losing my Dad — and discovering a secret warehouse of original Unimatic coffee pots. (I kid you not — here’s the full story.)
I realized how privileged I was to have had that experience with my Dad: those moments, those conversations that often began with him pouring us a second cup. ☕️
When I found the pots, I saw a vision:
What if we could help other families linger at the table for just a little longer, too? What if we could give the gift of those conversations to others?
Caffè Unimatic was born.
It grew into creating a line of coffee inspired by a few things:
The archetypes of the feminine (which, if you know the work of Carl Jung — and read my last post — you might have already realized).
And lots of conversations with Dad about surrounding oneself with reminders of who we want to be (I bet my coffee packaging makes much more sense now).
Once we helped thousands of families spend more time around the table, over coffee… a new idea was taking shape.
How do we help families stay connected through the chaos, change, and fast pace of real life?
How do we give them a way to have the conversations that matter, in a productive way?
How do we offer them some of the wisdom I learned from my dad — about people, about communication, about leadership?
Before we had all the neuroscience we now teach in BRAVE® workshops, we had families making space for brave conversations every week, because of their coffee.
I gathered groups of people with fundamentally different viewpoints — and invited them to talk over coffee. They watched in awe as every conversation that could have been divisive… ended up being connective.
In 2019, I committed to having one BRAVE Conversation a week. Some weeks, I had many more.
It changed me.
It changed my life, my relationships—including my relationship with myself.
It showed me just how much we need this.
Soon, people started asking me to bring it into their teams.
Misalignments. Miscommunication. Cultural rifts.
I stepped in and used BRAVE® to serve.
Sometimes literally — by opening the session with a coffee tasting.
Whether I was gathering a struggling executive team, a group of 9/11 survivors, first responders, Muslim community members and NYC students, or women on both sides of the Kavanaugh trial —
I watched as BRAVE unearthed empathy and built new shared perspectives across the table. No matter who it was, BRAVE® unified.
And then COVID hit.
I moved everything to Zoom.
And in just the lockdown period alone, I led hundreds of virtual BRAVE® sessions — with teams across time zones, across continents, and across cultural divides.
I hosted weekly sessions for Seth Godin’s altMBA alumni.
I started teaching leaders alongside Simon Sinek’s team.
Because now everyone could see it:
They didn’t just need better communication.
They needed a shared language of connection.
How do you build an unshakable team that can move fast, make decisions, grow, and stay aligned amidst massive change —when the only real leverage point you have… are your conversations?
I watched as these conversations not only connected people more deeply to each other — but to themselves. To the leader, the partner, the parent, the person they wanted to be.
And while I always loved hearing business outcomes in follow-ups, what lit me up even more were the "surprises" they shared:
Renewed relationships at home.
Rekindled romances that had previously been falling apart.
Conversations with teenagers that seemed impossible or with parents who’d been estranged for years.
This was exactly what I hoped for.
That working with teams would have ripple effects at home.
That this was the way we could spread our impact.
And almost before I knew it, BRAVE® took off.
But it all started with my Dad — and the hours we spent at the table having conversations, over coffee.
For me, this mission has always been personal.
And now, as Mother’s Day approaches, it feels even closer to my heart.
As a new Mom, I see more clearly than ever:
The small, everyday moments around our tables shape the leaders, the dreamers, and the humans our children become.
So when you decide to host a BRAVE® workshop, engage in a longer culture program, put yourself or your team through a certification “for work” —you’re doing so much more than supporting your scaling efforts.
You’re supporting the families your company serves.
Because before you serve clients, you serve your people — and their families.
And their state impacts the way you’re able to serve your clients.
Every time you choose to communicate with more presence, more vulnerability, every time you listen actively and respond BRAVE-ly, you’re creating ripples that reach far beyond the office or factory walls.
You’re shaping the conversations that happen at breakfast tables, dinner tables, and late nights over coffee —for generations to come.
That’s the table I want to build with you.
And I hope you’ll pull up a chair.
To your legacy,
Elisabeth