About Ellen
I’m Ellen Scherer Crafts.
Certified Life, Advanced Executive & Speaker Coach. ICF Member. Emmy Award-winning producer. Television Academy Member. Civic leader.
The career that built the coach.
I didn’t become a coach despite my career; I became one because of it. Thirty plus years across corporate America, Hollywood, nonprofits, and small business ownership taught me how to lead through ambiguity, navigate change I didn’t choose, and rebuild when the path disappeared.
I’ve been the corporate leader trying not to lose herself, the entrepreneur starting over with no safety net, and the woman who had to figure out what came next. Now I help other women do the same, with someone who’s been in the same rooms they are navigating.
This is that story.
My Career Path
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Early 1990s – 2005
Foundations
Started in crisis work, a runaway and homeless youth center, a drug and alcohol rehabilitation program, before six years producing live entertainment and casino events (Diana Ross, Smokey Robinson, live HBO boxing), then building a performing arts nonprofit from the ground up, then running meetings and events for American Express and Caesars through a string of corporate ownership changes. That early range, crisis work to corporate events to nonprofit governance, is where I first learned to operate without a fixed script.
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2005 – 2015
Merck and MUFG: The Corporate Years
Seven years as Merck’s outsourced strategic partner for global meetings and events, leading the JANUVIA, JANUMET, and DULERA product launches, building their Strategic Meetings Management program, and was named to the Merck/Schering-Plough M&A transition team as one of the few outsourced partners. When a follow-on role at Aimia didn’t fit, I recognized it fast and left within the year, the first time I chose to step off a path and not wait to be pushed. From there, Union Bank recruited me to join their marketing team and build their Strategic Meetings function; I navigated my fourth corporate takeover when MUFG Americas took over, then left while pregnant with my daughter, no safety net, to go all in on building Macrocosm Entertainment with my partner Trevor Crafts.
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2015 – Present
Co-Founder & Producer — Macrocosm Entertainment
Built an independent transmedia company from scratch, no studio backing. Released Lantern City with BOOM! Studios, and The Not-So Secret Society graphic novel through KaBOOM!, along with other titles. Won an Emmy for myself and our film Street Gang: How We Got to Sesame Street, which also had a Sundance premiere and was released in theaters and with HBO/HBO Max (US) and Universal (international).
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2016 – 2024
Civic Leadership
Volunteer leadership with the Women’s March LA Foundation and Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America across California and Connecticut, see below.
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2018 – 2025
Freelance Producer & Speaker Coach — Point Global Productions
Delivered executive presence workshops and 1:1 speaker coaching to senior leaders at pharmaceutical and Fortune 100 companies. Co-created and facilitated The Presentation Shift, a full-day executive speaker coaching program.
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2026 – Present
Founder — Life Crafts Coaching
My career path taught me how to lead through ambiguity, navigate change I didn’t choose, and rebuild when the path disappeared. Now I help other women navigate the same reinventions, through individual coaching, executive coaching, and speaker coaching under The Stage.
Activism & Civic Leadership
One of the organizers of the largest Women’s March in the country.
In January 2017, I helped organize the Women’s March in Los Angeles — the largest Women’s March in the country that day. I served as a volunteer leader of the Women’s March LA Foundation nonprofit and helped produce the 2018 LA march as well. These weren’t just events; they were acts of civic leadership at historic scale, built from the ground up by a team of volunteers who believed that women’s voices could not be silenced.
This work was formally recognized by the City of Los Angeles, the Board of LA County Supervisors, and the City of West Hollywood.
Advocate for families and gun safety.
From 2018 to 2024 I served as a lead volunteer with Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America across two states: leading the statewide Wear Orange Campaign in California in 2020, serving as Communications Lead in Connecticut in 2022, and managing the Be SMART for Kids program, a gun safety education resource for CT families.
My activism isn’t separate from my coaching practice. It is the same work expressed differently. The march opened doors for women at scale. My coaching opens them one woman at a time.
Curious if we’re the right fit?
Schedule a free 30-minute sample session — no agenda, no pressure.