My Story
Cristina Muntean here. From a small village in Transylvania, Romania, to where I am today, I bring you stories of exceptional resilience, a passionate love affair with human potential, and a raw dedication to what is real and true, and to strategic thinking, co-creation, and major positive impact on our world.
Here Is What You Should Know About Me
We Are Our Story
Every leader is shaped by their origin story. So am I.
Born in a fiery winter of 1981 in a small village in Transylvania, I came into this world at a moment when my country of origin, Romania, was about to plunge into its last darkest years of communism.
With two hours of electricity per night, I grew up listening to my grandfather’s stories. I learned how to read and write by the candlelight. I discovered chocolate when I was eight and the first truck with humanitarian aid reached our village right after the Revolution of December 1989.
All these experiences shaped who I am, what I honor, and whom I serve today.
What Can You Expect From Me?
A fierce dedication to what is real and true; no bulls**t. I call this integrity.
An even fiercer dedication to learning by being curious, courageous, and open-minded; this is what helped me escape poverty and grow into becoming a global entrepreneur, founder and CEO, and community leader. I call this freedom.
Last but not least, you can expect to be able to rely on me with your life. I call this partnership. If we decide to work together, I will bring all I know to the table and I will go with you in the trenches or wherever your wars are being fought.
Because you should never walk alone. I do this because I believe firmly that our greatest purpose in life is to give the world what we missed when we needed it the most. My destiny was to walk alone many times. You don’t have to.
Why Do I Love Serving Women CEOs?
Contrary to our current wasteful, predatory, and ultimately devastating approach to natural resources, we are now shifting into a resource-nurturing model of thinking and being that requires a different mindset and a different style of leadership. Women are in pole position to lead this greater, long-term sustainable transformation that our world urgently needs.
This is why I love serving women CEOs. By supporting the Queen, so the Queen can perform her holy work and drive massive positive transformation in our world, I, too, bring my two cents to this greater positive transformation of our world.
I do this through my personal, individual executive development efforts, and we do it through VORNICA®, my own company on a mission to triple the number of women CEOs in Europe by 2030, through our learning portal THE VORNICA ACADEMY®, and through our leadership development and career acceleration community for exceptional women leaders THE CEO ELEVATION CIRCLE ®.
The Problems We Solve
What Doesn’t Let My Clients Sleep at Night?
I started working with Cristina in a period of multiple changes in my work and private life. I needed to identify my values and key priorities. With Cristina I was visiting different areas of my work and private life step by step. During our sessions we discussed topics ranging from business, philanthropy, and my personal life. I was able to name and describe the challenges and consequently decide for my concrete steps and actions. Cristina is able to help with a wide scope of questions starting with personal daily routines to hiring strategies, PR and communication, target setting, embracing diversity etc. With her great questions she helped me find my own answers. Cristina is more than a coach; she is a psychologist, a communication specialist, a lifestyle advisor, and a friend.
When clients — present, former, and future CEOs — come to me, they are typically challenged by one of these issues:
How to Succeed Without Disappointing
My clients are about to be promoted into a new, higher role and they want to get it right from the start in terms of strategy, communications, stakeholder management, and, ultimately, their greater impact on the job.
How to Be a Trailblazer
My clients have just landed a high-powered role – CEO, board member, head of NGO – and they want to use their power for good to make the greatest positive impact they can make from the very beginning. We then apply systemic leadership to map and amplify their impact through strategic initiatives, public affairs, and better corporate and social governance.
How to Master Crisis Management and Crisis Communications
From speculative investor attacks, which are four times more likely to happen to publicly listed companies that are led by women, to labor accidents, cyberattacks, and other unfortunate situations, my clients engage me to channel my former business reporter skills and to help them navigate these crises successfully and with more ease, positive impact, and grace.
How to Leave a Legacy
This topic typically emerges in two situations – when the client has built a solid legacy in the organization they are about to leave and they want to secure a brilliant succession, or when a former CEO wants to use their name, network, power, and influence to continue driving positive transformation in the world long after their official CEO mandate has ended.
Why Am I the Right Coach for You?
Versatility Über Alles
Every single service I have ever developed is firmly grounded either in my personal work and life experience, or in the vast experience of my clients – present, former, and future CEOs.
Ten years of business journalism combine with more than 14 years of extensive and diverse professional qualification in human and organization development to create a unique blend of versatility, smarts, and depth. This blend is aimed to address your complex challenges and to nurture an enduring personal, mindset, and leadership transformation.
Strategic Communications
My experience as a former business journalist comes to serve my clients best when you need to prepare for a tough presentation, Q&A, panel discussion, or media interview.
- Prepare for your next keynote talk.
- Master investor and media interviews.
- Navigate crisis communications.
Emotional Intelligence
Our communication is nothing but embodied emotional intelligence. This is why my robust qualification in emotional intelligence can serve you best when emotions threaten to get the best of you.
- Expand your self-awareness and self-regulation.
- Bring empathy into communications and leadership.
- Engage in wise decision-making.
Systemic Leadership
CEOs don’t operate in a vacuum. My job is to help you see the intricacies of your team, organization, and stakeholder systems coming together, and the impact of your decisions on the entire whole.
- Develop your systemic thinking.
- Master intricate stakeholder management.
- Drive positive impact beyond your organization.
Purpose Beyond Profit
Profit is the hallmark of a healthy organization; ethically generated profit used in the service of nurturing the organization and its stakeholders long-term is even better. This is how you can create a long-lasting legacy.
- Manage shareholder relationships.
- Communicate transformation.
- Understanding systemic dynamics in teams.
- Leave behind a sustainable legacy.
Take a Look at My Education Credentials
How I Became a People Developer
Certified and Accredited Mentor and Coach
I am an Associate Certified Coach (ACC) with the International Coach Federation (ICF), on track to my Professional Certified Coach recognition. I am also a Senior Practitioner with the European Mentoring and Coaching Council (EMCC) and a former member of the EMCC global center of excellence in mentoring.
Multiply Certified Enneagram Professional
Since I first encountered the Enneagram in January 2010, I felt in love with this robust people development system. Thus I became a certified individual and team coach, consultant, and trainer with the Enneagram. I am a life-long certified professional in the Narrative Tradition by Enneagram Worldwide (Helen Palmer), and an individual and team coach and consultant with the Enneagram as certified by The Enneagram in Business (Ginger Lapid Bogda). Equally, I am a certified and accredited member of the International Enneagram Association (IEA).
Systemic Dynamics and the Power of TED*
Besides the Enneagram, my second leg of thought leadership rests on systemic thinking. I am a multiply certified systemic practitioner with a focus on systemic team coaching (Prof. Peter Hawkings) and systemic dynamics in organizations (Jan Jacob Stam, Jan Bilý). Equally, I am a licensed practitioner of The Empowerment Dynamic (TED*), a powerful people development framework created by David Emerald and Donna Zajonc.
How My Former Media Experience Serves My Clients Today
Choosing What Must Endure
One of the most challenging decisions CEOs need to make is choosing between what must transform and what must endure in an organization – and in their lives.
I, too, had to make this decision. When I lost my job as the deputy editor-in-chief of the Czech Business Weekly, the only English language business magazine in Czechia, in April 2010 as a consequence of the magazine being closed down, I thought my entire world had ended.
You see, I was a journalist through and through. Literally, when I entered the profession I thought the only way they would get me out of it would be to find me dead one day behind the computer in the newsroom and to drag me straight to the grave 😊. Hallelujah, a life well lived. Or so I thought.
But life had other plans for me. My saving grace during those fateful days after our layoff was that, as a business reporter, I had worked extensively with CEOs and their spokespeople to craft my media stories.
This is how CEOs – and subsequently women CEOs – became my main business audience. Immediately after losing my job, I started offering media training and crisis communication services to my former sources – CEOs and their executive teams.
The rest is history, as they say. Yet, I will never be able to express enough gratitude to my former journalistic profession.
Today I use my journalistic skills to conduct CEO interviews, facilitate panel discussions, speak, prepare executives for difficult situations, and write my books. We never really lose anything; however, if we choose wisely between what must transform and what must endure we might just end up on the right side of history.
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Speaker Profile
I will energize your audience with my no-nonsense, real, raw, intense, and passionate approach to the topics I discuss on stage. Expect an abundance of enthusiasm, expressive gesticulation, and high audience engagement. Note: Your photographers will have a field day trying to catch me in a steady position 😊
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Let's Talk
If you are a current, former, or future CEO – or an event organizer addressing top leaders – I would love to get to know you and potentially to work with you in the future. Please book a call with me and let’s talk.
