Dartmouth entrepreneur, Ann-Marie Flinn, knows more than most about the importance of being brave in this life — and the inherent benefits therein.
In 2018, Flinn pulled the parachute on her job with Proctor and Gamble after a 30-yr. Career in staff training and development. A six-month break and some breathing room, and Champion Foundational Change Agency was born; the goal of which is to help women “create optimum performance, greater productivity, and higher prosperity by implementing a champion mindset.”
Flinn, who comes from a military family, spent her first eight years at Shearwater and remaining childhood years in Cole Harbour. She became, among other things, a competitive figure skater and Atlantic Canada’s first female scuba diver while a naval reservist. Not unimpressive feats, given a few emotional and physical challenges.
“I can tell you that with all the adversities I was facing — I was born with a club foot, have scoliosis, and one leg longer than the other — there are lots of reasons why I shouldn’t have been a competitive figure skater, and why, being claustrophobic and not liking water, I shouldn’t have been able to dive like I did,” she says.
And therein lies the spirit of what propels Flinn forward — in life and in business. A tagline revolving around the idea of tapping into our inner champion fuels her organization and is ultimately her own personal mantra in life.
“People have asked where and how I’ve gotten my successes and I really think it all starts from within. If we show up with the right mindset — that we can achieve anything, even with adversity —then we’ll get to where we want to go,” she says. “It’s not about waiting until you’re fearless, to start.”
And fearless she is, putting words into action by making yet another leap — this time into the world of body building, eventually ending up at world class competitions.
“I started lifting weights back in the 90s as a way to get stronger for carrying my diving equipment around. I soon realized I could sculpt my body to whatever I wanted it to be and that’s what got me into bodybuilding,” Flinn says.
Winning every competition she entered, she then took a 20-yr. break to raise her family, getting back into it again at the age of 46, once more moving up the ranks very quickly — in both Canada and internationally, reaching an impressive 7th out of 30 competitors in her category at the 2019 world championships in Spain. Now officially retired from the sport, she’s got her sights and focus firmly set on helping other women find that same inner strength through mindset and leadership coaching.
“We have to be our own champions. We think our inner critic is us but it’s not us. It speaks to us based on things we’ve been told and things we think we should be doing,” she says. "That inner critic thinks it’s protecting us against what it feels might be dangerous out there, but we also have an inner champion, so how do we start bringing that champion back out, and start listening to it so we can move forward?”
And it’s that important discussion, along with many others, that Flinn fosters in her clients on a daily basis, and looks forward to discussing in a larger forum, early next year.
In March 2024, Flinn with be holding her second annual Champion Women’s Summit. The event, entitled Go Beyond in 2024! Reclaiming Your Champion Starts Within, takes place in downtown Halifax at the Westin Nova Scotia, and is geared toward women entrepreneurs, those working in the not-for-profit sector, and those working in organizations. Among other things, she’ll be talking about finding the courage to be authentically yourself in both your personal and private lives, something most women know full well isn’t as easy as it sounds.
“This is all about helping women show up before they show up.”
For more information on Ann-Marie Flinn’s work or to register for the Champion Women's Summit, visit her at changecamp.ca
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