Interview: Denice Hinden — Eighteen Years of Coaching and One Belief That Has Never Changed
There are professionals who arrive at coaching because they were always drawn to people development. Denice Hinden arrived because her business was in trouble. Six years into leading Managance Coaching, she noticed that even the strongest strategic plans her firm produced were being shelved, unimplemented. Something was missing. A colleague suggested she work with a coach. What followed was, by her own account, one of several transformative journeys in her career, and the one that changed everything about how she understood leadership development. Today, as a Master Certified Coach holding a credential earned by fewer than ten percent of coaches worldwide, she works at the intersection of leadership development, neuro-informed coaching, and organizational effectiveness, helping nonprofit and association leaders build the inner capacity that turns good intentions into lasting results.
The Origin Story: A Business Problem That Became a Calling
Denice did not set out to become a coach. She set out to fix a credibility problem. When clients began praising Managance Coaching’s strategic planning processes while quietly shelving the resulting plans, she knew something fundamental needed to change. The coaching experience she undertook to address that business challenge ended up reshaping her entire professional identity.
She enrolled in coaching school eager to learn the art and science of asking powerful questions and expanding leaders’ thinking. What she found there was something she had not anticipated: deep joy. “I discovered a deep joy in guiding and supporting leaders in growing their confidence, taking risks, and experimenting with better ways of leading. It continues to be my mission.”
Her coaching philosophy crystallised around a core belief she has carried ever since: leaders create better opportunities for themselves, their organisations, and their communities when they become more conscious of how they think, relate, and act. That framing, placing consciousness and capacity at the centre rather than skills or strategies, has shaped every engagement she has led in the eighteen years since.
A Journey Shaped by Service, Relationships, and Opened Doors
Denice’s professional roots run deep in the nonprofit sector, shaped from childhood by parents who modelled what compassionate action looks like in practice. Her father, a criminal defense attorney, taught her to look beyond circumstances and see the humanity in every person. Her mother helped launch one of Pittsburgh’s first Meals on Wheels programmes, introducing Denice early to both the challenges people face and the difference dedicated action can make.
She graduated from high school intending to become a lawyer, discovered her passion in the nonprofit sector instead, and spent years facilitating strategic plans and organisational change initiatives before the pattern she could not ignore became impossible to dismiss: even strong plans often failed to produce lasting results. The missing ingredient, she came to understand, was the readiness of leaders themselves. “When leaders strengthen their self-awareness, relationships, and ability to navigate complexity, they create the conditions for teams and organisations to flourish.”
Throughout that journey, she was also the beneficiary of leaders who saw possibilities in her before she could see them herself. That experience of being invested in by others became a defining thread in her own leadership philosophy, and a reason she treats her work not as a service transaction but as a genuine act of service.
Coaching Methodology: Neuro-Informed, Holistic, and Built for Real Complexity
As a leadership coach working with nonprofit and association leaders, Denice structures her work around a dynamic process that moves from raising awareness through expanding perspective to establishing new leadership practices that become effective habits over time.
Every engagement begins with understanding the leader holistically: their wellbeing, values, strengths, motivations, beliefs, unique identities, and aspirations. From there, work moves through clarifying leadership identity, exploring inclusive practices, strengthening strategic thinking, and developing practical capabilities that hold up under genuine organisational pressure.
Her coaching is strongly influenced by the neuro-informed frameworks of Positive Intelligence, Conversational Intelligence, and Energy Leadership, three approaches that help leaders understand how their mindset, emotional regulation, language, and perspective shape their thinking, feeling, and action in ways that most leadership development programmes never address directly.
In the past year that work has informed the development of the Stress-Less Leadership Toolkit and Lab at www.managance.com, a programme designed to help nonprofit and association leaders build self-awareness, regulate reactions, engage communication, build trust, and lead with greater positive impact under pressure.
When working with organisations, she integrates individual and team coaching deliberately. “Leaders need safe spaces for themselves, and organisations thrive through relationships.” Coaching within the context of day-to-day work creates opportunities to apply new insights immediately to real situations, transforming awareness into action and action into outcomes that last.
The MCC and the Irony of Coaches Who Resist Change
Denice’s commitment to ongoing professional development led her to earn the International Coaching Federation’s Master Certified Coach credential, held by fewer than ten percent of coaches worldwide. The journey, she is clear, was not about accumulating a credential. It was about deepening her coaching presence, sharpening her skills, and continuing to examine her own assumptions and practices.
Along the way she became a Certified Mentor Coach and discovered a passion for supporting other coaches’ professional growth. That work led to Think Different, Coach Better at www.thinkdifferentcoachbetter.com, a mentor coaching programme that also offers continuing education credits around coaching neurodiverse leaders.
She is candid about an irony she has observed over eighteen years in the profession: coaches, like most people, do not always welcome change. When new standards or credentialing requirements are introduced, resistance within the profession is common. “This reaction fascinates me because so much of our work involves helping clients navigate change and uncertainty.” The lesson she has drawn from it is direct: continuing education is not simply about accumulating knowledge. It is about modelling the growth mindset and adaptability we ask of the leaders we coach.
Final Insight: Dancing in the Rain
Denice closes with two quotes that have guided her through decades of work and life. The first, anonymous: “I volunteer because I want to change the world before it changes me.” The second, from Vivian Greene: “Life isn’t about waiting for the storm to pass. It’s about learning to dance in the rain.”
Together they capture how she understands leadership, coaching, and the work she has dedicated her career to. “We cannot control every circumstance, but we can choose how we show up in the face of uncertainty.” Coaching, in her framing, is a joy-filled way of dancing in the rain. A practice of helping leaders and coaches strengthen their capacity, discover new possibilities, and navigate complexity with greater awareness, intention, and confidence.
“Every circumstance contains the potential for opportunity. Coaching helps us recognise those opportunities, act on them with purpose, and create positive impact for ourselves, the people around us, and the communities we serve.”
To connect with Denice Hinden or explore her leadership coaching and mentor coaching programmes, connect with her on LinkedIn.
