#0: Welcome to the Ignite Your Leadership Podcast
Description:
Welcome to "Ignite Your Leadership" with your host, Tina Marie St. Cyr. In this inaugural episode, we embark on a journey of transformation and empowerment. Why the rebrand? We recognize the pressing need for genuine leadership guidance, strategies, and support. Our mission extends beyond coaching clients and certifying exceptional coaches; we collaborate with executive coaches and corporate trainers, aiming to ignite the potential in leaders at every level. Whether you're a seasoned executive, a frontline manager, or an aspiring leader, this podcast is your compass for personal and professional growth.
As we delve into the essence of leadership, remember: true leadership begins with self-leadership. For those who aspire to elevate their impact, whether through improved communication, conflict resolution, or project management, you are our focal point. Join me as we explore my own journey from a young corporate newcomer to a seasoned leader, driven by an innate spark for orchestrating change and fostering growth. Together, let's ignite the leader within and embark on a path of purposeful leadership. Welcome to "Ignite Your Leadership."
Bio:
Tina Marie St. Cyr is a dynamic force when it comes to personal development, leadership, and communications. She is a board-certified executive coach and a licensed corporate trainer specializing in human communications and human relations. With over 12,000 hours of application, study and design of programs, her methods for helping people create immediate and lasting results are extraordinary.
Her specialty is in bringing new, transformative perspectives to a situation, allowing the human ability to solve problems flow easily. Her fascination with ‘why we humans do what we do’ and her unique ability to create an air of curiosity and wonder in her audiences has made her a revered public speaker and expert guest on human transformation.
Tina Marie’s unique blend of certifications and degrees allows her to work with people from all backgrounds and cultures. Business owners will realize steady and scalable growth, positive team synergies and ever-increasing leadership skills. Entrepreneurs will have a highly experienced advocate and coach by their side advancing them to their true revenue results.
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Websites:
Email all inquiries to: hello@bonfirecoaching.com
Transcription:
Hello and welcome to Ignite Your Leadership. I'm your host, Tina Marie St. Cyr, and this is technically Episode Zero. Why have we rebranded our podcast here? It's because we see so many needs for true leadership strategies, stories, support in the work we do here at Bonfire Coaching. So, bonfire Coaching is my firm where we not only certify amazing coaches, we also partner with executive coaches, corporate trainers in the marketplace. And our entire want with bonfire coaching is to enable and empower the leaders, be it executive leadership, vice presidents, directors, and then frontline managers, supervisors, and even individual contributors who desire to be leaders or know that there's this inner calling for more in their career. Maybe they're really great at what they do, and, and there's just this energy and this fuel saying, I wanna do more for my organization, but I don't know where to start or how to navigate that.
(01:08):
So the leader inside of you is, is first a leader to themselves, and that's where it all begins. You know, for those people that lead others and they're not looking introspectively into their own way of being their own personal habits, their own communications, or wanting to or have the desire to grow, then there's some challenge that can develop there. But for those leaders, which I'm sure you are, whenever we have our career around us, and we just know that, oh, I could help people more I I wanna learn how to listen better, I wanna learn how to, to help navigate projects or conflict or communication, I wanna be given that challenge, and I wanna have some sense of fortitude rise up inside of and, and go the extra distance to make it happen. You are our audience. You are so our audience.
(02:04):
And so I wanna share a little bit about my personal story as a young individual contributor and corporate America, where that came from. And it even started before then. So I have this natural leadership spark, so to speak, that I didn't recognize, because who here ever looks at themselves in such a way to say, Hey, I'm a leader. We don't, there's just a, there's a natural authentic way of being that emerges throughout our life, right? So as a, a youngster, literally in grade school, I found myself orchestrating playtime, orchestrating project outings wanting to help communicate field trips, organizations possibilities, how-tos. There was a park in my junior high. There was a, a piece of land across the street from our junior high that was just overgrown. It was pretty ugly, actually. And I, I came to find
(02:58):
Out that the city owned this particular piece of land for whatever reason, it was literally off Navigation Boulevard in Houston, Texas, and it was across the street from Howard Hughes manufacturing plant. And I went to Jackson Middle School. And so in, in my middle school days, literally picture a young Tina Marie at seventh grade, I ended up working for the school in the cafeteria. So I, I, I always had this drive to not only create value and serve, but I love making money. I just do, I'll admit it. There it is. It's out in the open. I making money. I, I started a landscaping business, or ob you know, just mowing lawns whenever I was young. You know, employed some of the boys on my block and, and this, this natural leadership ability inside of me has been there since, I guess one, maybe my mother, she was still alive here, she'd say, yeah, since you were born.
(03:53):
But so this piece of land across the street from Jackson Middle School was vacant. Appeared vacant, very overgrown. And I was on the student council. And so I had the thought, you know, who owns that? What could we do with that? Wouldn't it be fun if that were a park? And so I seeded that possibility into the sponsor, our sponsor for Student Council's mind. We had some votes on it. Movement happened. We contacted the media. The media thought that was a great idea. The city council for Houston got behind it. We transformed the entire thing to a park, and it's still a city park today. So I share that because, you know, inside of you there is this, I just call it like a spark. It's an energy. It's, it's something that inside myself, I feel it, it calls to me, and it, it doesn't turn off.
(04:46):
And it's looking for the innovation. It's looking for the new, it's looking for the next solution. It's looking for the, how can we help each other. It's looking for the connections. And that's what leadership is about. Now, this particular version of our podcast came out of the Light Your Life podcast. Now, light Your Life has had many episodes over the years, and it's full of amazing wisdom and so many wonderful guests. There was a thread, a theme that kept coming up. And even in the business and the work that we do as bonfire, and what I do in the world, leadership has its own challenges, right? And so for leaders, we do have this fuel, this want, this growth, this passion, this aliveness. Yet we also meet with the, are we living by our own standards? Are we living our own rule set? Are we, or are we under the, the thumb of something else, some other organizational structure, and we're having to navigate? Are we holding ourselves back? Are we willing to go the distance and follow our authentic
(05:56):
Leadership style and allow ourselves to just come from that? Or are we, are we subdued? Are we tolerating? Are we settling? And so for myself, moving out of the young version of Tina Marie into high school leader within the high school realm as well, and many different avenues and, and, and ways of being. And then, you know, going into college also, finding leadership there and illustrating events for the entire campus. You know, just seeing possibilities. Here's a, here's a need for a solution. Let's go design it. And then from there, going into corporate America, and whenever I, I got into corporate, that's the first time I remember clearly being in a container where there were rules, there were other people's rules, and you had to abide by them. Now, of course, my parents are gonna go, Hey, we had rules at home, <laugh>, you needed to abide by those too.
(06:51):
And, and I did. Yet they didn't feel constrictive. You know, growing up in my household, we had possibility mindset. We had, you know, what would you love? Let's go explore. Let's adventure, let's grow, let's do things. And, and very rarely was I, it's not that I wasn't told no, I was told, how can you make happen? So if I had something I wanted or needed or desired, I was given the, the knowing that I was resourceful, you know, tap into your resourcefulness and design it, make it happen. I didn't take no for an answer very often because I found a way through, right? So corporate America, what happened there is whenever I first come into corporate, and you know, I respect the corporate framework, it's needed. We need to have the understandings of roles, responsibilities, who's, who's doing what, when the timetables, the project plans, this is how things run and work efficiently.
(07:45):
Those are beautiful things. Yet, whenever I saw a problem set as an example I was in my, my first corporate job. And if you go into my LinkedIn, you'll see where that was <laugh> and I I saw that there was a mass amount of paper going into trash bins and not being recycled. Now recycling this was 1991. And so recycling was like all the trend, right? It's like people that had recycling in their neighborhoods and things like that. It's like, oh, you're recycling. This is great. It's back. Whenever I would rinse out my milk cartons back whenever I would use plastic milk cartons, and I would, you know, rinse out the cans and all these different things, I had a can crusher. So for me, recycling was needed. In fact, I even started the grassroots recycling program in the city of Houston. And so I was very connected to recycling and that particular mindset. So when I went to work and I see by the copier, these huge copiers, right? Huge bends of paper that, you know, you print it off your report and the margins
(08:54):
Are, are off. And now you know, the, or you printed, you know, only on one side and you want it to be front and back. And so entire reports and entire, you know, bundles of paper, were going into this trash bin. And I wanted to know, where does this paper go? And I found out that it goes into normal trash. I'm like, well, we could recycle this. Do we have a recycling program here? And the answer in many regards, which is no, we don't have a recycling program here. It's too expensive. And so I decided, this is me. This is how I do, I break roll but it's more pop. Let's get it done, right? I brought extra recycling bins. I bought blue recycling bins. I put them and in the copy areas by these, the huge printers and copiers and they started filling up and on Fridays, or you know, even Wednesdays 'cause they were full.
(09:48):
I would take my recycling bins, put 'em in my car, take 'em home, and recycle 'em in my neighborhood. And so I was doing that, not knowing <laugh>, not knowing do you know you're taking confidential company dockets off site? <Laugh> didn't think of it that way. I was doing good things. I had a cape behind me, miss Recycling girl. And so HR did come to me and said, you can't be doing that. And I said, okay, so how can we do it? Well, what was interesting there is that self-leadership, the organization, let's do it anyway and see what happens. And me ended up starting that recycling program because the company said, people want this. We can do it. How much does it cost? Let's, let's put it in play. And then it was a company-wide initiative. And it exists to this day.
(10:34):
So inside of you, you have leadership. That's why you're listening to this podcast. We all have this sense for growth. Now, what are we gonna bring you? What am I gonna bring you as your host here on this particular podcast? And why would you wanna subscribe here? First, it's gonna be self-leadership. There are going to be times where we are up against our own confusion. I don't know what to do. Maybe we're pulling our hair out. Maybe we're just like, I can't take another day of this person. I can't take another day of this project. I can't take another day of this. You know, going to these meetings that don't seem to be going anywhere, wherever frustration lies, your lack of energy, your confusion, your head up against the wall, you come here, we're gonna be giving you answers, strategies, case scenarios from the people that are there doing it.
(11:20):
And together we're a community of leaders. And so I guarantee you're gonna be walking away with nuggets that you can employ and put in play immediately. Also, we're going to be giving you how do you lead your teams? How do you build a team? How do you hire, how do you write somebody up? How do you lead, how do you guide? How do you mentor? What's the differences there? How do you position right training? How do you offload things that are no longer needed? How do you prioritize? How do you hold meetings? How do you have huddles? How do you bring in vendors
(11:53):
And onboard them into your team to have them also feel connected? How do you have mergers and acquisitions of teams so that, so that both cultures come in together and become one? There's so many aspects of leadership that we're going to dive into with Ignite your leadership. I am on fire about it, hence the name. And then it's, it's not only self-leadership and leading teams. It's, you know, how do you lead entire organizations? Because that's a whole different game sometimes, you know, we're gonna attract the solopreneurs here that wanna scale and build a business. Fair enough? Awesome. Here we go. And then we're gonna have those middle managers, the directors, the VPs. Maybe you are a partnership and you wanna know how to have more effective communications with your partner, more organized effectiveness and, you know, scalability of your, of your company.
(12:47):
Maybe it comes down to branding. How do you lead branding for the visibility of your company, your department, your initiatives? So it's all here. I just wanna tell you, it's all here and it's going to be so much fun. I've already recorded some sessions and so I know it's coming and I'm excited by this. And I also have an entire pipeline of other people that are on, on queue for interviews and I am super excited. And so the other thing is that I wanna invite you to communicate. So many times, you know, we listen to podcasts and we don't communicate. So here's our phone number, and I'm gonna be saying this throughout our podcast, but I want you to have our phone number because I wanna hear from you. Things that I'd love to hear from you are what topic can we dive into?
(13:33):
Where are you feeling challenged and unresourced? Where do you keep having a pat of something come up either for yourself or a team member? Maybe it's a team member. You're going, I don't know how to lead this person. I don't wanna get rid of them yet. It just feels like it's strained. Maybe you feel as though you've lost respect or trust inside your organization. Maybe you've lost trust or respect for one of your team members, yet you wanna regain that. So I wanna hear from you. And this is the phone number. You ready? (713) 332-3858. I'm gonna repeat that in case you are writing 7 1 3 3 3 2 3 8, 5 8. Now you're gonna go to bonfire coaching.com anytime you want, go to the source of the podcast or you wanna reach out because our number's right there on the front page of bonfire coaching.com. You can also find tina marie.com. Hey, that's me. I am the Tina Marie <laugh>. So I own tina marie.com. I've owned that URL since I was about 19 and I'm going on 55. So tina marie.com is another way to find me. And I want us to engage. I, I love that I'm in your purview. I love that I'm in your attention span. I love that
(14:50):
I'm in your ear. And more than that, I hope to become someone who's in your heart. 'cause I'm here for you. I know what it's like being a leader where things don't seem like they're going well. And who do you turn to? Because can we be honest here for a second? Sometimes we can't be vulnerable with the people that we look to as supervisors or directors or people above us because we feel as though if we show our weaknesses, they will not regard us for certain projects, advancements. Maybe they'll judge us. Where do we go? Where's the healthy sounding board? So if you call in or write in and we get you on the show, wanna hear from you, then we will change your name and all that kind of stuff to keep the, an anonymity so that you feel safe. Yet what you're going through matters to me and I want to hear about it and I wanna give you solution.
(15:40):
And our guests are gonna give you solution too. I will call on guests. So if you have anybody in mind, they think, oh my God, I just listened to this other podcast, or I just read this book, or I just went to this conference and this person spoke, that person needs to be on your podcast, Tina Marie, let me know I'm gay. Let's do it. 'cause I rely on you too, right? This is a community of leaders and we are here for you. So thank you so much for having the Ignite Your Leadership podcast. Be part of your weekly, you know, growth. And even if you listen to me once a month, I'm grateful, but do subscribe to us. We're also putting this up on YouTube so you can find it. Just go find Tina Marie out there on YouTube. Ignite your leadership and I can't wait to hear from you and hear how you're putting some of these nuggets and these strategies into play and how it's literally transforming your leadership.
(16:34):
And I wanna hear what your teams are saying too, as isn't that the feedback that we want? We wanna know there are team members are succeeding, are feeling as though they're growing, they feel accessible. They can come to you even if things are tough. They, it's an open door policy and, and you are not only accessible, but approachable and they see you as a leader who's really helping them. We're also gonna be sharing great books. So thank you again for subscribing to ignite your leadership and I can't wait to journey with you here and see you on episode one.