Redefining Transformational Leadership & Identity Based Culture Change – An Interview with Marya Firdausi Kazmi
- 16 hours ago
- 7 min read
Marya Kazmi is a Transformational Leadership & Identity Coach and educator who helps individuals and organizations examine identity and cultivate values- aligned leadership. Her work is shaped by lived experience and years of professional practice, informing the reflective tools she created to support healing, clarity, and growth. She is the creator of the RETURN framework, which guides people through a process of unlearning, reconnection, and coming home to themselves. Marya is also the executive producer and host of Pain to Power, a talk show exploring leadership, healing, and human-centered change. Her work bridges lived insight with practical strategies, inviting others into a healing evolution rooted in self-trust, belonging, and purpose.
Marya Firdausi Kazmi, Transformational Leadership & Identity Coach
Who is Marya Kazmi Hay? Please introduce yourself.
Marya Kazmi Hay is a Transformational Leadership & Identity Coach, educator, writer, and creative producer whose work lives at the intersection of personal healing and cultural change. As a daughter of immigrants, a single matriarch, and a mother of four, her life has been shaped by questions of identity, belonging, and responsibility in both family and professional spaces.
With more than two decades in education, she understands the power of language and awareness to shift lives. Her work blends lived experience with professional expertise, translating complex emotional and social dynamics into practical frameworks individuals and organizations can use in real ways.
At the heart of her work is a simple belief, leadership begins with self-understanding. When people examine identity, unlearn limiting patterns, and reconnect with their values, relationships strengthen, cultures shift, and communities thrive.
What inspired you to start Brown Girl Interrupting?
Brown Girl Interrupting began as truth-telling. It was born from the intersection of my personal healing and my professional work in race and equity. After leaving a long-term, emotionally destructive marriage, I found myself navigating divorce, motherhood across different life stages, and the unlearning of beliefs I had carried about love, strength, and responsibility.
Moving from toxicity into what felt like freedom forced me to see the layers of harm that had quietly shaped my children and me. Writing became how I made sense of that. Not as a victim, but as a woman committed to growth, accountability, and authenticity. As a
Bangladeshi-Pakistani American woman challenging cultural and relational expectations, my story became one of interruption and resilience.
What surprised me was how deeply it resonated. Women began sharing their own stories of silence, over-responsibility, and disconnection from self. Brown Girl Interrupting grew into a space for reflection, healing, and agency. That momentum expanded into Pain to Power, now in its fifth season, where storytelling continues to challenge assumptions and elevate human-centered leadership. Across writing, media, and facilitation, the message remains the same, when we come home to ourselves, we lead differently.
What is the core mission of your work with individuals and organizations?
My mission is to reconnect people to their humanity so they can build systems that actually sustain them. Healing isn’t separate from leadership, it is leadership. When people feel safe enough to be honest and vulnerable, they develop the awareness and emotional agility needed to lead with clarity and accountability.
Individually, this work examines how identity, socialization, and generational patterns shape behavior and decision-making. Naming those patterns breaks cycles that show up in families, partnerships, and workplaces. It increases agency and strengthens communication.
Organizationally, I help examine structures and norms that prioritize productivity over humanity. Soft skills like emotional regulation, trust-building, and reflective leadership aren’t soft at all, they’re foundational to adaptability and long-term success. When individuals shift, relationships improve. When relationships improve, culture changes. That ripple effect is the work.
How do you help people transform pain into personal power?
Pain becomes power when it is understood instead of internalized. I create spaces, through coaching, courses, and facilitated dialogue, where people can examine their experiences within the context of identity and systems, rather than seeing them as personal failure.
Using reflective frameworks, I help people identify belief systems and survival strategies that once protected them but now limit growth. In group and organizational spaces, we surface shared patterns and examine how structures reinforce them. From there, we practice new ways of responding, setting boundaries, communicating clearly, and leading with intention.
Healing becomes sustainable when insight turns into action. That’s where power lives.
What specific services do you offer through your coaching and workshops?
All of my services are grounded in the RETURN Framework, Remember, Examine, Transform, Unlearn, Reclaim, and Nurture. It’s a process that moves people from awareness to embodied change.
I offer one-on-one and group coaching, leadership workshops, and organizational consulting focused on identity-based leadership and culture transformation. My work includes facilitated dialogue, systems analysis of practices and belief structures, and custom learning experiences for teams.
I also lead Empowerment Unlocked, a multi-session course rooted in RETURN. It combines reflection, dialogue, and practical tools that strengthen emotional regulation, self-trust, and values-aligned leadership. Whether coaching individuals or consulting with organizations, the goal is the same, help people come home to themselves so they can transform the systems they are part of.
How does your podcast Pain to Power support healing and growth?
Pain to Power uses storytelling as a pathway to healing. Through honest conversations and counter-stories, the show challenges stereotypes and expands how we understand identity and leadership.
It affirms listeners while offering language and tools to navigate resilience and growth. Stories become mirrors and windows. They help people see themselves and see others more clearly.
The platform also elevates smaller businesses and creatives through intentional collaboration and strategic alignment. It is both a healing space and a leadership platform.
What makes your approach to healing and self-discovery unique?
I don’t separate healing from leadership or personal growth from systems change. My approach integrates identity work, emotional awareness, and structural analysis.
Many people can name their pain but don’t know how to move forward. I focus on translation, turning reflection into usable tools through frameworks, dialogue, and practice. Because my work is rooted in both lived experience and professional expertise, it resonates across personal and organizational contexts.
Healing isn’t something separate from everyday life. It becomes integrated into how we think, communicate, and lead.
Can you share a success story where someone experienced real change through your work?
One client first worked with me in a professional setting, seeking support with team dynamics and high-tension moments. Through structured reflection and dialogue tools, she began responding differently under pressure. That work led her into deeper personal growth through my course, where she recognized how the patterns at work were connected to her identity and leadership story.
Another woman came to me after a separation, beginning to name the reality of a long-term narcissistic relationship. Our coaching centered on mindset shifts and grounding practices. Over time, her decisions became more intentional. She moved from survival to stability, rooted in clarity and self-trust.
For me, success is when insight becomes everyday practice. When people begin living and leading differently because they understand themselves differently.
What challenges do your clients most commonly face before they work with you?
Most clients arrive capable but exhausted. They try to control outcomes or manage everyone around them to feel safe. They overgive. They lose themselves. Often, productivity has replaced self-worth.
In leadership spaces, this shows up as unclear communication, avoidance of difficult conversations, or overfunctioning instead of building shared ownership. Many leaders sense inefficiency or disengagement but haven’t yet connected it to deeper patterns shaped by identity and belief systems.
They’re not looking to be stronger. They’re looking to feel whole, grounded, and aligned.
How do you help businesses build inclusive and equitable cultures?
I help organizations examine how identity, power, and unspoken norms shape everyday culture. The work begins by creating conditions where people feel safe enough to engage honestly across differences.
From there, we analyze policies, leadership habits, and belief systems that reinforce inequity or foster belonging. Inclusion becomes sustainable when it is embedded in how leaders communicate, collaborate, and make decisions, not treated as an add-on initiative.
Humanity and performance are not competing priorities. They strengthen each other.
What’s one message you want every reader to take away about healing and empowerment?
Healing doesn’t mean we are broken. It means we’ve been conditioned into patterns that no longer serve us.
Coming home to ourselves means honoring who we are across the intersections of our identity and choosing response over reaction. When individuals do this work, they reclaim agency.
When organizations do this work, cultures shift.
Empowerment interrupts generational harm and replaces it with intentional leadership and healthier systems, for ourselves and for those who come after us.
Additional thoughts
Beyond coaching and consulting, my work extends into storytelling, production, and public dialogue because I believe culture shifts when conversations shift. As the executive producer and host of Pain to Power, I’ve learned that media is not just content, it’s leadership in action. The way we ask questions, hold space, and elevate counterstories shapes how people see themselves and one another.
Production and hosting have strengthened my ability to facilitate high-stakes conversations across differences. Whether I’m moderating a panel, leading a workshop, or interviewing a guest, I’m attuned to identity, power, and the emotional undercurrents that influence dialogue. That awareness allows me to create rooms, virtual or in person, where people can be honest without losing structure or purpose.
I also serve as a keynote speaker and facilitator for organizations navigating cultural change, leadership development, and equity-centered growth. My goal in every space is the same, move beyond surface-level conversations and into reflection that leads to practice.
The work I do is not theoretical. It is lived, structured, and scalable.
If this work resonates with you, I invite you to connect. I partner with leaders, teams, and organizations ready to strengthen culture, deepen self-awareness, and lead with greater clarity and accountability.
You can explore my writing, listen to Pain to Power, or reach out directly to discuss coaching, consulting, or speaking engagements. Transformation begins with a conversation.
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