After a successful high school and college wrestling career, Steve went to work for Marriott Hotels where he excelled in the Rooms Division/Front Office Areas.  A natural people person and problem solver, his career advanced through 6 different Marriott properties including the Essex House Hotel on Central Park in New York City.  Upon marrying his wife Suzanne, and fathering his first child, Steve chose to change his career so that he would be able to spend time with his son.  Steve’s parents both worked when he was a child, and he wanted to have a different relationship with his children and be more involved than what he had experienced.
 

Steve had attended a life skills program known as Lifespring that opened him to a new dimension of coaching and team building.  As a former collegiate athlete, this new found skill and experience inspired Steve to start coaching and leading team building programs in an outdoor setting known as “High Ropes” team building, in addition to starting his own executive recruiting firm.  For thirteen years Steve operated both businesses as Stephen C Gironda and Associates.  After the attacks of 9/11, recruiting became untenable, so Steve began Torch Learning Programs.

 

In addition to Torch Learning Programs, Steve began coaching his sons in baseball, soccer and wrestling as well as becoming a Head High School Wrestling Coach.  Altogether, Steve amassed 39 seasons of coaching sports from the High School level all the way down to the youth levels (5 and 6 year olds).  This experience led Steve to focus Torch Learning Programs on teen leadership programs as well as the High Ropes team building.  The teen program known as the Torch Academy has produced extraordinary results in its graduates, including major improvements in dealing with stress, peer pressure, communications with parents, friends and teachers.  Additionally, because Steve brings sports psyche into the program, many of the Torch Academy grads are athletes and they have truly excelled in their sports.

Steve’s mission is to serve everyone he has the privilege to work with.  That includes his two sons Stephen Jr. and Daniel for whom he has an extremely close and trusting relationship.

 

Information About Steve's Interview

 

Steve's Five Key Principles For Being a Great Parent and Coach

 

1.  Keep perspective always.  No sports result - victory or loss - is ever more important than the love of your child and that your child feels loved.  Yelling and screaming at your child over a sporting event is not only a waste of time, it is a waste of their spirit.  When you start to diminish a child’s spirit, you begin to destroy trust and ultimately your relationship with them.

 

2.  Unlearn the bad lessons you got from your coach or your dad/mom.

In order to do so, you must look at the lessons you learned from your previous coaches/teachers and your parents and choose which lessons are truly worth passing on.  For me, that was letting go of the idea that in order to discipline a child properly, there must be punishment, like a spanking or a slap in the face, or a really harsh screaming event; all are a lazy and hurtful way to teach a lesson that can be taught in other manners.

  

3.  Practice Patience.  One of the most important ways to show your child love is to be patient with them and allow them to make mistakes, with the confidence that you will be there to help them through and wholly accept them and love them.

 

4.  Believe in your child.  The more you show your child that you believe and have faith in them, the more they believe in and have faith in themselves. When your child has that kind of relationship with you, YOU will be amazed at what they can do!

 

5.  Be trusting and trustworthy.  If you wish your child to truly embrace abundance, you must exhibit trust in others (especially your child) and trustworthiness in how you live your life.  One of the most important lessons I have learned is that my children are not a blank canvas for me and my wife to draw on.  Our children came out hard wired with many of their own feelings and ideas already functioning. It was up to my wife and I to lay foundational principles of integrity, responsibility, morality and conscience by behaving that way as an example. It required unconditional love and letting go of “how my parents did it” as a lone guideline.