About Coach Mike
Michael A. Wiggins – “Coach Mike”
Leadership Strategist | Certified Coach | Community Advocate
Founder, Progressive Traditions Leadership and Coaching
Who He Is
Michael A. Wiggins, known as Coach Mike, is a leadership strategist, certified coach, speaker, trainer, and community advocate with more than 25 years of experience developing leaders and strengthening organizations.
As Founder and CEO of Progressive Traditions Leadership & Coaching, he works with individuals and organizations across corporate, nonprofit, educational, government, fraternal, and community environments. Through leadership development, coaching, speaking, and organizational consulting, Coach Mike helps established and emerging leaders increase their effectiveness, expand their influence, develop others, and lead beyond their title.
At the heart of his work is a personal passion: adding value to people who are passionate about adding value to people.
Mission
The mission of Progressive Traditions Leadership & Coaching is to develop people, strengthen organizations, and impact communities by helping leaders increase their effectiveness, expand their influence, and add greater value to others.
My Story
Leadership and developing people have been part of my life for more than 25 years, long before I ever called myself a leadership strategist or started a coaching business.
My journey has taken me through corporate America, coaching, community service, fraternal leadership, and organizational leadership. I have had the opportunity to lead teams, coach young people, develop professionals, serve communities, and lead a statewide organization of approximately 5,000 members. Each experience has taught me something different about people, responsibility, influence, and what effective leadership really requires.
My own leadership journey has not been without difficult lessons.
In 2016, an experience I now call my “Impossible Day” forced me to reconsider how I was managing my responsibilities, priorities, and ultimately myself. Years later, another major transition came when, after more than two decades in corporate America, I found myself rebuilding professionally and eventually stepping fully into entrepreneurship.
Those experiences reinforced something I now teach other leaders: Become the person your responsibility requires you to be.
A title, position, or opportunity does not automatically prepare you for what comes with it. Growth has to be intentional.
That understanding helped shape Progressive Traditions Leadership & Coaching.
I believe effective leadership requires us to value what experience has taught us without becoming trapped by what we have always done. We should preserve what deserves to remain while having the courage to evolve what needs to change. That is what Progressive Traditions means to me.
Today, my work is about more than my own leadership journey. I want to help develop people who will develop other people, strengthen organizations that serve others, and create impact that reaches beyond any one individual.
I often describe it this way:
I am passionate about adding value to people who are passionate about adding value to people.
That is the work I want to continue doing, and the legacy I hope to leave.
Family First
Leadership is an important part of my life, but it is not the whole of my life.
Family keeps me grounded and reminds me that success means very little if the people who matter most only receive what is left of you.
The lessons I have learned about priorities, presence, responsibility, and relationships influence how I lead and how I coach others. I believe effective leadership should not require us to neglect the people and responsibilities that matter most.
For me, family is not something I try to fit around the work. It is part of what gives the work meaning.
“Strong leaders are built the same way strong families are - with love, trust, and consistency.”
What He Does
Coach Mike works with individuals, teams, and organizations to strengthen leadership at every level.
Through coaching, leadership development, speaking, workshops, and customized organizational experiences, he helps established and emerging leaders become more effective, expand their influence, develop others, and produce meaningful results.
His work spans corporate, nonprofit, educational, government, fraternal, and community environments, with a growing commitment to developing young people before leadership titles and positions ever arrive.
Whether working with an individual leader or an entire organization, the goal remains the same: intentional growth that leads to greater impact.
Community Impact & Advocacy
For Coach Mike, leadership and service have always been connected.
His community work has included nonprofit leadership, civic engagement, youth development, charitable initiatives, and advocacy focused on strengthening people and the communities they serve.
Today, he continues that commitment through leadership and service opportunities across New Jersey and beyond, including his role as President of the Prince Hall Masonic Charity Foundation of New Jersey.
His approach to community impact reflects a simple belief: leadership should ultimately make a difference beyond the leader.
Fraternal Leadership
As a proud Prince Hall Mason, Coach Mike served as the 91st Grand Master of the Most Worshipful Prince Hall Grand Lodge F. & A.M. of New Jersey from 2021 to 2023, leading nearly 5,000 members. His F.I.R.S.T. framework, Financial, Intellectual, Resourceful, Spiritual Teachers, became a statewide leadership blueprint focused on service, stability, and legacy.
Today, his fraternal leadership continues through service on national and international committees whose work supports charitable efforts and community impact in the United States and abroad.
These experiences continue to shape his understanding of influence, accountability, tradition, organizational leadership, and the unique responsibility of leading people who do not have to follow you.
Why It Matters
Leadership never affects just the person holding the title.
It affects the people they lead, the teams they build, the organizations they serve, and ultimately the communities those organizations touch.
That is why leadership development matters.
Coach Mike believes leaders must intentionally become the people their responsibilities require them to be. As their effectiveness increases, their influence can expand. And as their influence expands, so does their opportunity to add greater value to others.
This is the work of Progressive Traditions Leadership & Coaching.
Develop people. Strengthen organizations. Impact communities.