When you learn art you understand that an encounter with art involves a .trialogue or three way conversation between the art , the artist and the observer

First you need to take the work of art seriously by observing carefully what’s there and what’s not/ Then you have to look just as seriously at what’s going on  inside of you as you observe the art to see how you  are reaction, what repels you, what delights you. You have to peel back layers of awareness so that you can begin to ask what it means to you’”

 The world is in information glut. Information used to be an essential resource in helping us overcome technological and social problems, but our very technological cleverness has transformed data into garbage. While the information industry works overtime to build better computers that can store more information by the gigabyte the world is no more successful at extracting real wisdom from it for living our lives and solving real social, ecological, political or even economical problems. Education insists on pumping even more facts in the students heads with less and less connections between the bits., Most of us have an image of conversation like chating:the exchanges are quick, jerly and often without development of ideas. We are deleting the thought process, yet we are saying we have no time for reflection.

 Once a society loses the capacity for dialogue all that is left is a cacophony of voices battling it out to see who wins and who loses. There is no capacity to go deeper, to find the deeper meaning that transcedes individual views and self interests. It seems reasonable to ask whether many of our deeper problems in governing ourselves today and loss of mutual respect and caring … might not stem from the lost capacity to talk to one another , to think together as part of the larger community”  (Peter Senge- Reflections on Leadership).

Steliana van de Rijt- Economu has more than 10 years international experience in Human Resources ,working for Kraft Foods, Vodafone, Nike and Shell.  She holds a Masters degree in Project management in Business although she mainly used project management skills within the HR and OD. She joined Shell 6 years ago in The Netherlands and her current role in London is Program Manager facilitating  leadership programs and managing a team of 10 facilitators who deliver a coaching course globally.  She is MBTI certified and has been using MBTI to increase interpersonal effectiveness in a team setting but also in 1to1 development interventions.  

Her passion in life is: „To give people all over the world the opportunity to rediscover their uniqueness and the power to follow their dreams” and driven by it she set up  in a village in Romania a small organization called Ithaca Journey offering people the opportunity to learn about themselves through experiencing the rural life.

Steliana believes that coaching is about freeing the human mind and unlocking the potential within so that the client can think better and get the confidence to initiate the change he desires. Her definition of a coach is that of a Catalyst in a chemical reaction, accelerating the change process but not consuming itself. Steliana sees herself as a transitional coach and her strength is the intuition to uncover the issues and assumptions by listening, asking questions and creating the environment to turn limiting assumptions into positive ones. Her approach is structured and goal oriented and she tends to adapt the coaching tool to the situation and the person.

What the clients said about Steliana’s coaching:

“After our first session, whenever I felt stuck, I kept using the question you asked: ‘turn it around’ and found this very helpful for moving myself on and changing my perspective. After the second I feel like I have a real plan for the next few months and a real awareness of both my work objectives but also how to cope with the negative thoughts and fears I will doubtless have when I earn less. I also found it useful to recognise that it’s within my power to change things on my own, whether small or large.” (British client )

“You listened and gave me the space to rumble and think freely. I liked that” (Dutch Client)

“You helped me see things in a clearer way and asked challenging, difficult questions to help me turn things around” ( Norwegian Client)

Steliana has completed the practitioner program accredited by EMCC: Foundation in Coaching with Icoach academy in London.