Stephanie Reynolds

First of all, it's my relationship with God. I grew up in a household where anything I imagined my parents made happen. If at a young age I decided I wanted to throw an event for teenagers because I wanted to start a mentoring program, my parents just made it happen. So from a very young age, I was empowered in my dreams. Even as an adult, I have a strong support system that helps to ground the things that I'm doing. But ultimately, it's my relationship with God that's at the forefront of everything that I do.

The best career advice I've ever received is to just not be afraid, to be fearless. To not allow fear to keep me from stepping out into the deep end, taking a chance on myself, or what I felt like I needed to be doing. Or at least to fake being fearless, because you may still have a little fear, but don't let it stop you and keep moving forward.

The advice I would give them is to make sure they are authentically themselves and able to stand confidently in who they are. To understand who they are, to be so clear about why they're here, what their purpose is. Because there's always going to be something that comes to try to shake you, something that comes to try to cause you to second guess and to doubt, and you have to know, before you can do anything for everybody or anybody else, you have to be completely sure of who you are. It doesn't mean that we don't have moments, because we're human. But in those moments, having a foundation that you can go back to and say, no, but this is who I am, this is the authentic version of me, and I'm not going to allow anyone to cause me to diminish who I am and what I'm supposed to be doing, no matter how big or how seemingly small it may be or appear.

From an education point of view, especially private education, one of the biggest challenges is that as the economy is changing, private school is not necessarily as important for a lot of people because financially they can't afford it. So education is just shifting in terms of private school overall. In terms of coaching and the whole personal development space, there are just a lot of voices out there. Some are good, some are great, some are not so much. So it's really about making sure that what you're doing, how you're approaching it, and how you are giving the information, the advice, and the consulting is accurate, and that you're able to rise above all of the noise, because social media has made everybody an expert. And then, of course, I'm a woman, and I'm a woman of color, so that adds another layer to it, especially when you go more into the executive coaching and going more into the corporate space. Oftentimes, I'm the only one in the room, and so being able to just navigate that.

I think one of my core values is to have a heart of service. In everything that I do, my heart is to legitimately serve people, to be a place of service for others. The other thing is just to see people from a place of love and not judgment. That helps in terms of coaching and all of the things that I do, because you have to be able to see people for their potential and see people beyond the things that they're going through in that moment. And then just really trying to be the best version of myself. As I'm the best version of myself, then that helps me to give people the best version of myself and to help them to get to where they're supposed to be, because I am committed to getting to where I'm supposed to be.