About Christine Maassen

Where I’ve come from

I arrived in Canada from Belgium in October of 1988, with nothing but my set of chef’s knives and $500 in my pocket (yikes!). Back then, I worked in the hospitality industry, in a discipline we refer to as Food and Beverage, or F&B. Armed with my chef training and “front of house” experience, I started running the food services at the newly opened National Art Gallery in Ottawa. It wasn’t long before I began seizing one exciting professional opportunity after another.

Developing as a leader

On multiple occasions, I was asked to take over the leadership of teams that were deemed “dysfunctional” and requiring a “complete overhaul”, by which my bosses meant that I should fire everyone and rebuild from scratch. Really? I thought. No one on these teams was good at anything? Rather than blindly following advice from the powers-that-be, I did my own thing—something I’ve been known to do over the years.

Practicing and discovering

It took me a while to notice a pattern emerging whereby—sometimes very quickly following my taking over—the team I was leading became high-performing and, on top of that, we were having a blast. My eagerness to understand how I was leading differently is what motivated me to study industrial psychology, human resources management, executive coaching, leadership and, eventually, to redirect my career into human resources management.

Redefining leadership

Fast forward to 2022, and I am fundamentally convinced that we have an urgent need to redefine the leadership model in our organizations. Many existing systems and the behaviors they reward result, best-case scenario, in short-term success. But that’s not the worst part. To put it simply and candidly, I am incredibly sad to see organizations make people sick, be it physically or psychologically. That’s what my work is focused on: Bringing Humanity to Work.