“I have had the opportunity to work closely with Mahshad in a professional context, most notably through her design and facilitation of a group coaching program for our senior academic leaders in the Faculty of Animation, Art, and Design during a period of significant organizational transition. This work required a careful balance of understanding our institutional context, the management approaches of individual leaders, and the complexities of the large teams they each must manage.
The goal for the sessions was to enable each of them to better emotionally process these complex dynamics to create a more grounded approach for communication and decision making. The work required that Mahshad embody a nuanced understanding of leadership dynamics and the emotional demands placed on individuals operating in high-stakes environments.
Mahshad brought a rare combination of empathy, insight, and practical leadership coaching to this engagement. She designed and delivered a structured series of 90-minute group coaching sessions, grounded in clearly articulated developmental objectives and supported by extensive preparation. Her approach balanced intellectual clarity with emotional intelligence, creating a space in which leaders could reflect deeply, talk about resistance, and move toward more effective and sustainable ways of working together and with their teams.
In a sea of corporate leadership professional development opportunities that are often transactional, Mahshad’s approach was relational enough to enable the group to unpack resistance and difficulties in a way that got at the heart of many leadership challenges: fear. In the safe space she created, the group engaged in a deeper exploration of their own patterns and tactics that may have been contributing to their leadership challenges, and pivot to new ways of thinking. Along the way, they found new levels of support among each other.
What distinguishes Mahshad’s work is her ability to operate simultaneously at the individual, group, and organizational levels. She is adept at identifying core themes that emerge within leadership groups, translating them into meaningful coaching interventions, and holding participants accountable to both personal growth and collective outcomes. Her facilitation style is warm, perceptive, and deeply respectful, while also being appropriately challenging when required.”