Monica Calenti

Monica has been involved in marketing and communications for 15 years, initially working with multinationals in the consumer goods sector, then with advertising agencies, supporting numerous clients in developing their brand communication strategies and campaigns.

Twenty years ago, she founded Calenti & Partners, whose distinguishing feature is the ability to identify the point where the business culture of the client and the values, attitudes, emotional intelligence and talents of the candidates overlap.

She has always firmly believed that it is not past experience and performance that predicts a candidate’s future success in a new company, but instead their talent and potential, their capacity to learn from experience, their emotional intelligence.

Prior to becoming a coach, she completed numerous courses of study and became certified in business coaching, Communication, Problem Solving, Strategic Coaching, systemic coaching and management constellations.

She completed a two-year course in Leadership and Organizational Learning in Switzerland and graduated from the Ontological Coaching and Somatic Coaching program at Newfield Network in Colorado, USA. She is also certified in the use of the talent-based assessment tool, the Clifton Strengths Finder.

She works alongside managers and executives, helping them to navigate change, learn new behavioral approaches, and evolve their leadership skills.

Her client companies are important multinationals in the consumer goods, automotive, luxury, fashion, communications and banking industries.

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3 questions for Monica Calenti

You are focused on two distinct areas: executive search and coaching/development. Is there a connection between the two?

Anyone who undertakes a coaching or assessment process to enter a new company is motivated by the search for greater satisfaction, greater well-being. They want to improve, to grow. Sometimes the change of company satisfies this need; other times, when remaining in the same company, it is necessary to change something, acquire new skills, new styles of behavior for which the support of a coach can be a great help.

This energy that drives people to put themselves on the line in order to change and improve fascinates me. Figuring out what will allow them to truly achieve what they’re looking for, understanding the ingredients of success, has always attracted me like a magnet.

Our focus has always been on people and their projects. Whether it’s the organizations looking for a new leader, or the candidates we meet, or clients embarked on a development path, they’re always people who are working to build a project or to make a dream come true. It’s exciting for us to accompany them on their journey through all the steps that lead candidates and companies to choose each other, that lead coaching clients to discover new possibilities that will allow them to undertake successful new actions.

What else is there in common between those who undertake a coaching program and those who change companies?

There are some common critical factors of success.

Any development path is based on change, as is choosing to change company. If I’m not reaching my goals by myself and I undertake a coaching program, it’s certain that I will have to change something, something that may have served me well but that is now hindering me, or is no longer working for me in my current circumstances.

When I enter a new company, it is certain that there will be things that I can bring to the new context, but also many others that I will have to change, and this requires great humility and openness, as well as the ability to observe oneself and the context.

If we know ourselves, we know how different situations can impact on us, how we react when we’re stressed about a deadline, or when there are conflicts to be dealt with. So we know our areas of difficulty and comfort, when we have to be careful. And if we’re also aware of the kind of impact that our behaviors have on others, we can better manage and understand the possible reactions.

That’s why in coaching we work on building awareness. If I don’t know where I’m starting from, where I am, it’s difficult for me to build a clear path to my goal.

You work with talent. Searching for talent, developing talent. But how much can a person truly grow, evolve and change?

I don’t think you can become someone else, someone completely different. But the research behind the Clifton-Gallup Strengths Based Development methodology demonstrates that we can become the best possible version of ourselves. Discovering our talents and building on them allows us to evolve, to exploit them to the fullest and to make giant leaps, while remaining our authentic selves. Friends have always made fun of me for the time and money I invest every year in training, but I am very grateful for all the courses I’ve done, for they’ve allowed me to get to know myself, to grow, to have more tools available to use in assisting our clients to develop, but also to be happy.