Conscious Leadership: Mark & Kirstin interview by Chaitali Desai

auto generated transcript Announcer : Entelechy leadership stories, the podcast for Conscious Leaders, we share the lessons learned from global leaders, making an impact for their organizations, stakeholders and investors. For people, community and environment. We get inspired by their experiences, attitudes, and practices. Here are your hosts for Entelechy Leadership stories.

Kirsten Gooldy and Mark Stinson. Chaitali Desai : Hello, my fellow Rebels. I'm Jake Elliot Desai, thank you for joining me as I share practical tactical success secrets to help you embrace your inner rebel, ignite your soul's desires, and own your magic. And today I have the pleasure of hosting two special guests who actually introduced me and really got me thinking that I could do this podcast myself.

I was a guest on their podcast and before I even get into all of their goodness, I'm just gonna bring them on. Kirsten, welcome back. Mark. Welcome to the Beauty Confidential Lounge podcast.

I am so honored and grateful that you guys said yes. I can tell this is gonna be a lot of laughter, so everybody tune in because this dynamic between Kirsten and Mark is so special. So I would love for you all to introduce yourselves and a little bit about you, and then we're gonna dive right into all of your goodness. Kirstin Gooldy : So every, Hi everybody, I'm Kirs St.

Godi and I am lot of different things, but truly I'm committed to making this world a better place, be it through business mysticism, however it works. I'm really glad to be here. Chaitali Desai : I'm so excited. Mark Stinson : And Mark, Yeah, and I'm, I'm Mark Stinson.

I call myself a brand innovator and a venture catalyst. So rather than a venture capitalist, I don't just throw money at companies, I try to put some sweat equity in them and bring and catalyze their business ideas to life and help them brand them. Chaitali Desai : Oh, I love that. So is that actually how you guys came together or, Okay.

Wait, let me back up Kirstin Gooldy : <laugh>. Chaitali Desai : So let's talk about how I connected with you guys. Kirsten and I, we have, uh, mutual friends, and then she introduced me to Mark and I got to be on Anki leadership podcast, which you guys do together. And let's talk about that.

How did you create the concept of the podcast of like for you guys to come together and collab it? Kirstin Gooldy : Let's start with I was somebody in need of Mark's brand innovation. I really, I know his wife well and I think very highly of Mark and who he and the skillset. So we were with Mark, everything starts with coffee.

That's the price of it. He has two prices of admission, coffee and do the work <laugh>, like if you're Chaitali Desai : Not gonna do my love language. Kirstin Gooldy : Yeah. Like those are his two things, right?

So that's the price of admission. And then it all happens starry night, right? Mark <laugh>. There Mark Stinson : You go.

One of those, Kirstin Gooldy : Those moments. Mark Stinson : The podcasting was a thing, and I don't know if you remember, but there was a pandemic over the last couple of years. And so we were having coffee literally, what, a month, two months before this. Mm-hmm.

<affirmative>. Yeah. And so this would be January of 2020 and said, Boy, wouldn't it be great to bring a voice to some of these ideas and some of these concepts of enlightened leaders and conscious leaders? And so we're having coffee about this and said, let's start a podcast.

And we were literally like one and a half episodes into this. When the pandemic hit, we couldn't meet in a studio anymore, so we got comfortable on Zoom. We couldn't have live guests anymore. So we got comfortable inviting guests.

And so the more this thing snowballed, this turned into what could have been twice a week, but it was certainly a regular weekly program where we brought leaders from all over the world and now people were more available. So we invited people we would never thought we could have gotten to be on a program. And little by little, we're talking to Fortune 500, uh, CEOs, we're talking to leaders at universities, we're talking to entrepreneurs and, and global impact players. And it's been a blast.

Chaitali Desai : Everything about your dynamic, how you guys are bringing people on to showcase not only them, but to see how they're gonna help impact the people listening. That ripple effect that I am all about this. Because the more we can bring people together and moving in the same direction, I can't even imagine what the future holds Mark Stinson : For us. That was fun because it would just, we just started and it's evolved over time and we've laughed with each other because is this a management podcast that allows spirituality to be discussed?

Or is it a spirituality podcast where we talk about management, we warn the guests, we don't know which is going to come out that day. And uh, we, we've had leaders of financial billion dollar venture funds. Yeah. Go.

I've never talked about my inner self of before in a management context or any other program. And uh, so we seem to attract it and bring it out of people. Chaitali Desai : Yeah. Kirstin Gooldy : But it's, and what's beautiful about that too is as we started the podcast, we've had the ES mark mentioned, we've had an, an evolution and we really don't even know where we're going.

I can't say there's any great master plan. Every, the, our commitment was to having fun. That was our first, and for the minute, it stops being fun and it becomes a job. We're out.

Right? Like we just agreed to that. That was a premise that we thought was really important. But secondly, what we began to see, we really understood there is a momentum for conscious leadership, right?

It's really starting to happen. And we interviewed in our first season a lot of people who have spent their life dedicated to cultivating conscious leadership. It was like one person here, one person here. And what's been beautiful as a result of this pandemic, the leaders themselves as a result of this great resignation and many other, you call it tension points, are embracing this notion of conscious leadership.

Because people truly cannot go back into the workforce and do it the way they did it. And it's just been brilliant to watch an unfolding of leaders really begin to embrace a new way, which is what many thought leaders have been hoping for a very long time. Chaitali Desai : It's, it's like a paradox almost, right? Because it's, it took the pandemic to make that shift.

Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, it's, it's weird because for all like the negative of the pandemic and we've, I've had people that we've lost through the pandemic also, so I'm not minimizing that, but the innovation that has come out of the pandemic, the, the people are using more tools, more resources, and they're getting more creative in terms of how they're reaching the masses. And you're, this is a perfect example. So then what are you guys, when you started to think about, okay, we're gonna bring people on, Like were there criteria that you had or did you have, were you just pulling people out of the air so to speak?

What, how are you guys deciding that, okay, we wanna come talk to you? Mark Stinson : Certainly when we set a conscious leader, we had in mind somebody who was making an impact. Not just somebody making headlines, but somebody making a difference. And so we were attracted to many people's stories about maybe an impact on the planet, maybe an, uh, sustainability, global impacts, like the mom and pop stores great.

The mom and pop practitioner, wonderful. But we thought if this person was also making ripples, so they were not only doing something at the community level, but it was rippling out. Yeah. And uh, then also we wanted people who we at least thought would be open to talking about their inner guidance.

And uh, so that's what we hope to attract. Chaitali Desai : That's wonderful. Have you always been open on your own spiritual majority, Mark? Or was this after connecting with Kirsten that Mark Stinson : You were working?

No, I think it's interesting you asked that because obviously always open and I had a very, you know, robust meditation practice. I've always read, you know, personal development books and leaders. Um, but I think over time, but to see it in action more, and we've always talked about this great awakening where everybody is may maybe more authentic or maybe showing more of their personal selves. I I was caught up in that wave as well.

Chaitali Desai : Yeah. I find the podcast space really fascinating for this in particular thing because I know like for a long time I had my person and then I had my inner person, but they were not showcased in the same way. Does, does that make sense? Like at the inner wisdom kind thing, I would keep it like in the closet so to speak, cuz I was like, Oh, who wants to hear about the who?

But you guys, I found so much inspiration from the both of you sort of talking about the ripple effect. This was part of that, right? Like how you, when your guests come on, how, like, how do you start that conversation with them? Because again, oftentimes we're talking publicly one way, even though privately we have this like practice or these rituals that we do.

So how do you find your guests respond when you start going down that path? Does that make sense? Kirstin Gooldy : It does. And Mark, I I'd like to start with this, if you're okay with this, Mark, I, for the first and foremost, there's a lot of fun in the guest room.

A lot of play. And that speaks to that authenticity. We're coming in to talk about business and historically there's been no room for anything other than stoicism. Even if your arm is falling off and you're dying, right?

There's no, like, you have to show up and you have to act a certain way, otherwise it's really about survival. There's a survival game that gets played in corporations and, and then secondly on, it depends on some occasions as a medium, there are times where people get mini readings in the guest tur or taken off guard because all the spirits are talking to them, which is a real thing. And that's all joking aside, but I, I think it's that warmth, right? I think Mark people have spoken to and really we're asking people to show up as who they are and when there's permission given that creates a safe space to just be whoever they are.

And I, I will say one of my most moving series, and I think this Mark, I, I don't know what your, I'd love to hear your thoughts on there, but we did a series on amplifying black voices and that was one of Mark's ideas. And it was such a moving experience. And I would cry every time we interviewed somebody because we got to listen as white people to true stories with absolute truth. And, and I don't know about you Mark, but that to me shaped a direction that we moved into in a more meaningful way.

Chaitali Desai : What do you have to say to that Mark? Mark Stinson : Well Chaitali Desai : Definitely what, just add on to that cuz that's a Mark Stinson : Powerful Well it was very powerful and I think what now that you're mentioning it, Kirsten, the, the local impact and Global Ripples began to be visible in those conversations. So there was a real estate developer building affordable housing and sustainable developments in Atlanta, but then all of a sudden we connected with somebody doing the same thing in Australia, right?

It's like, and they knew each other but didn't really know of each other's work. Let's wait a second. There's a connection. We talked to a local pastor who said, we're more desegregated during the week than we are at church on Sundays.

Why can't we learn from the rest of the week? Why are we going to our quote unquote own church on Sunday? That was, that was a voice that just got me right between the eyes, right? Mm-hmm.

<affirmative>, which, so we're creative directors, individual, we talked to a banker, we talked. So these voices to Kirsten's point brought out this authenticity and that's where we didn't learn a lot. Chaitali Desai : And I also think it's interesting what made you want to highlight that? Like bringing on more of the minority sector?

Why? Like what prompted it for you? Mark Stinson : Both. I think literally the events of George Floyd and the Black Lives Matter movement.

But I think we realized that we could be telling a deeper story of intel, you know, of people trying to reach their full soul's potential and what were some of the systemic obstacles that they may be facing, you know, to reaching their full human purpose mm-hmm. <affirmative>. And, uh, so we focused on the human part, not just, hey, I'm trying to build a business and I keep running into, you know, obstacles, uh, cuz I can't get money and I can't get hired. So we, we were trying to get under that story.

Kirstin Gooldy : Yeah. And, and I will say too, on a personal level, for me, I come from an interracial family. I've been a female in business, in male dominated spaces, technology and telecommunication. And I'm a huge advocate for female rights and minorities, right?

It really is my love language. It's something that I'm very vocal about. Anybody who knows me, I'm usually on the front line. And I've actually learned a lot being with Mark because learning to have allyship.

I've always viewed the white man as the, just because of my natural interaction of being in, in Mother Mary to a black man in the seventies and communities that we lived in that we weren't allowed to be in. We all know my nephew last year was murdered on the streets of LA with 17 bullets in his body. Like this is very real stuff for me. So just even having that voice, it's, it's a very real aspect of all of our businesses because the minorities are the ones that actually make the businesses run.

Chaitali Desai : Yeah. I, I saw something yesterday, I don't remember what her name is right now, but she was actually talking about the change in not just CEO ship, but in terms of there are is a predominance of minorities coming up who are running companies differently now. Like you have to, it's becoming more open. But having your mindset coming into this conversation, Kirsten, or not this conversation, but into your podcast with Mark and having the, you know, the negative connotations for white men to a certain degree.

How did you guys then learn to collaborate? Because for the, for those listening on the podcast, they're both Caucasian out, like when you look at them, and so we Kirstin Gooldy : Don't put any wider <laugh> Chaitali Desai : Kinda white bread, I dunno how else to say that, but Oh, big statement. To have that mindset and then say, Okay, Mark, let's collaborate and then let's talk about Black Lives matters and minorities and what they're facing. That had to be really triggering.

Like, I'm feeling hot and bothered by it right now, and I'm not even part of that conversation. Mark Stinson : There were so many sweaty moments and literally we, we said we were waiting and we were leaning in and listening in. And at one point, I, I think on several of the programs, Kirsten, we might have just said, Look, our job here is to turn the microphone on. There might be 25,000 people listening.

There might be 25 people listening. We don't know. Sometimes podcasts are weird like that. Yeah, we just are gonna turn the microphone on.

And that's why we called it amplifying voices. We're, we're not creating, we talked to a book publisher, Tamika New House. She has such an impact of bringing young black authors to the market to tell their stories. We don't need to create the stories, we're just amplifying the story.

So that's what, you know, allowed us, I think from a collaborative standpoint, we said we might have ideas, we might have opinions, we might have experiences. Sometimes we'll share those probably most times we're here for the guest to tell their story. We might have a probing question, but we're not here to make their story. Chaitali Desai : Mm-hmm.

Yeah, true. But within the conversation, within like the dialogue that's, I don't know, I, it had to be like moments where you're like, it's, it can be both gut wrenching and at the same time you're just like, Oh my goodness, look at you. You're still here and you're still kicking ass. Like how it has to change you to a certain degree, not change you.

It had to out, for lack of a better word, open you up more. I Kirstin Gooldy : I will say there was a moment, right? And this is actually one of the intel key leadership principles, right? There's self-awareness that we can have and that we're really, as a conscious leader, we really dive into having this level of self awareness.

But beyond that, you have to have the courage to change with it. Like, it's great to know about yourself, but really when the rubber hits the roads, what are you gonna do with that? Yeah. And my probing was always listening for how the white man hurt us.

That's how my ears. And so I've worked in business my whole life. I've been with my white men my whole life. There really is nothing else at the top the way I grew up.

It's like you said, it's changing now. So I know how to interact with them and I really genuinely love Mark. Like he was somebody in my life that was meaningful and, but I was always listening for that undercurrent. And then, and so I probed in our interviews at that level and I would make those comments.

And there was a moment where Mark said, I am one of those white men. And I was like, it's f like it hit me. It struck me, like even my language impacting somebody I deeply care for. And there was a moment where Mark became human.

He became a human soul, somebody who was really dedicated and committed to making the world a better place. And yet I was continually probing for the other side. And it, it just was like a surrender in a moment where my own biases, which is everything we speak to when we're really looking at the systemic racism, my own biases, were keeping something moving that wasn't there. It wasn't Mark, it was me.

And that was a real profound shift for me to hear that and then to begin. And there was a softening for me in that like everything changed and even our guests, and I don't know if it was noticeable mark or not, but I know for me it was an internal shift that I was able to then take out and then understand, oh, I have a lot of allies. Not everybody is bad. There are a lot of people who wanna see a change and it, it's about the soul.

It's about what's inside, not about the outside, which I would've said I got that, but I got it at a level. Mark Stinson : I, I do think that was a lightning bolt or, you know, watershed moment in the podcast. And of course my defense mechanism, I probably said it in humor rather than, of course I'm in the room Chaitali Desai : <laugh>. But how did that feel for you?

Because it must, like, something had to triggered inside to be like, wait, but I'm here. Mark Stinson : Absolutely. But I, I think, and I don't know if it was in the same show or not, but I think about, we had a conversation with, uh, great friend called, uh, Harvey, Austin and Harvey and I had worked together over a decade ago, so I can't say I was really close with him then. We're a lot closer now because of the moment.

But I remember Harvey saying, I've been in so many meetings where it wasn't what was said. I could ignore it, I could walk away from it, I could process it, but why didn't anybody else in the room step up and say something? Why did the sort of slight go unanswered? Why did the uh, sort of lang Well, we could have laughed it off.

We could have said, Yeah, we're just being kids, but why didn't anyone say something? And I said, again, I was in the room, how many times did I not say something? So it was both eyeopening, I hope for the guests, eyeopening for the audience, but wow, it was eyeopening for Kirsten and I too. Chaitali Desai : Yeah.

And then how did it, in my opinion, I would assume it had opened up the table even more for conversation, right? Like now you're getting to that next layer is do you Mark Stinson : Feel that? Well now, I don't know. Kirsten was probably more fearless than me going into this thing.

I, I get nervous every time we turn the microphone on and just hope maybe after 10 seconds we're, we're over it. But, um, we're more, we're more fearless now than ever. Kirstin Gooldy : <laugh>. Yeah.

I don't have a problem probing again, like about, like they really, when you really think about the dynamic, and this is speaking to the male female, Mark really is the butterflies and rainbows. Let's play some good music, let's have some fun. I'm like, girl, I'm getting inside. I'm gonna tear you apart and I'm the forefront everything that's wrong with this world.

And you would think that that dynamic because just on the Myers Briggs, both Mark and I are e and tj, but we get to the same place at the same but way different ways. And it really is funny mark's, Hey, I have a, a role of music, let's play it. This is the theme of how bad it is. And I'm like, mm-hmm girl, we're getting in there.

Just get Mark Stinson : <laugh>. And that's why we laugh at the, at the end of every conversation, the guest goes, Wow, I had no idea that's what this was gonna be. And I go, How do we bottle this? Wait, there's no way to describe what it is.

Chaitali Desai : No, it's magical. And it's really, I, I love it because again, you are coming at it differently, but you're both moving it, it's moving forward. And so I know you said you don't know what will be next, but what would you love to see happen in your podcast? What would it evolve to if it could evolve?

Like when it evolves, what do you imagine it's gonna be? Kirsten, Mark, who to dive in? Kirstin Gooldy : What's beauty for me is this is the beauty and we're working on that right now. The truth is we're, we're not sure, but we haven't been sure since the beginning, which is the magic in and of it, it became what it was supposed to be.

And I really believe that everything has a soul. So that in and of itself is its soul's evolution. We just had a commitment to have fun. I, I know and speak to leaders and speak to leaders who are really committed to making a difference inside of that.

It has found its own voice, its own rhythm. And we don't, we're, we're at a point now where we're looking at what is next, right? No a is there next, what is next? How do we do next?

What do we both need in it? And I think that's the other piece is from a collaborative standpoint, really honoring each other's needs as well. Like how does that look in, That's a real dialogue Mark Stinson : Because we went into our third year, we knew that the title of the podcast might guide us. It's intel, it's leadership and its stories.

So with Intel key leadership stories, and it's quite a ice breaker. People go, what is intent? Everybody goes running to the, the source to find out what the heck this means. And so that sort of unfolds and then leadership can be defined in so many ways.

The leadership at the home level, leadership at your, you know, community level or at your church or synagogue or temple. But then the stories, it wasn't just how I got to where I was and climbed the corporate ladder, but how did you become who you were? Like you were asking earlier, Chatal. I, I think the guidance of where we go next, we just wanna find people who are living their soul's potential and who are leading others to do the same in whatever, you know, place or forum that might be.

Chaitali Desai : Oh, that is wonderful. I'm really excited to see no ma, I know I'm more excited to know what's gonna come next because I just see, so I just see so much like greatness and you, someone said this to me once, they're like, you're not waiting for a seat. You're building the whole table <laugh> and everyone that you bring to the table. It's been so powerful, like listening to the podcast.

For those of you guys listening, um, here I'll be definitely dropping the, in the show notes, the link to their podcast because there is so much goodness and you guys don't, it's fun to be on the podcast, but you guys are talking about real topics. Like, again, talking about the minority situation, when George Floyd, all of that came about. I, it was gut wrenching, but to bring voice to it and to have the open communication being, I can't, like I'm emotional right now thinking about it for some reason.

Thank you to both cuz I don't know fully if you see the impact that you are making yet. Oh, Mark Stinson : We appreciate the feedback. Chaitali Desai : Mm-hmm. <affirmative>.

No, it's huge. And I mean that from bottom of my heart. I think that's why I'm so emotional. I, oh, I'm really excited.

I'm glad at a loss for words. Okay, so I'm gonna stop rambling <laugh>, but if I've had a loss for words, I apologize. Kirstin Gooldy : I I, if you're okay with it, I'd like to pick up something there. Because what you are experiencing right, is the truth of what people experience every day.

And we're so busy creating leadership conversations that are about, here are three tips to becoming the top leader. And we're not talking about to Mark made a comment about how we became the leader. We became, it was not easy for anybody. Mark has had his stuff, I've had my stuff, you've had your stuff and we all have this story behind it.

And what we don't really embrace is the gravitas, the, the ness it takes to actually get up every day and live in a world where it doesn't always appear to pull for us. I believe it does pull for us, but it doesn't always appear. And it is emotional and it is real. And these are the untold stories that don't get heard from these boardrooms.

What, how many executives, and I'll speak mainly for the males that have missed raising their family because the environment didn't allow them to stay home, right? Yeah. So these are things, these are real conversations that Mark is pointing to. That's that authentic, I Chaitali Desai : Got all choke them myself.

Yeah, I'll just leave it there. Okay. I think this is a beautiful moment and I thank you again, both of you for all of that. Thank you for coming on and I, I'm honored to be in your space and to know you both and I cannot wait to see what this next iteration is gonna be because whatever it is I can feel is gonna, that table is gonna be even bigger.

So thank you both and thank you for coming on. Thank you. For our listeners, I would love to know what your highlight of this was. So definitely come back and share with us because this is just the beginning.

Thank you so much for coming on and like always, I'm wishing you a beautiful day. Announcer : Thanks for listening to Entelechy Leadership Stories with Kirsten Gooldy and Mark Stenson. Connect with us on LinkedIn and visit our website, pure intel key.com.

I'm Jared kj. Join us again for our next episode of Intel Key Leadership Stories.