Beyond Pro Podcast: Leadership Insights For Women In Business

Thanks for listening to the Rise without Compromise Podcast.  Today I'm talking to you if you're feeling exhausted, depleted or just plain tired.  Here are the links mentioned in today's episode.  Recommended Resources:   Sign up to receive my weekly Leadership Letters In praise of micro moves The question I keep asking myself this season Decision fatigue is real. And I have it. What you need to get about decision fatigue Join LEAD.Well – a community of practice for women who want to be better, braver leaders Book a complimentary call with me Join me on Twitter here

The show is back!  I'm thrilled to be back on the mic, and in your earbuds.  This episode is an audio version, with bonus riffs, of my weekly Leadership Letter newsletter.  You can sign up to get the full letter, including added curated content for leaders, over at StephaniePollock.com  The original essay first appeared here.   

“The most important possible thing you can do, is do a lot of work.” ~Ira Glass Over my years in coaching, I’ve heard many, many stories about something being ‘too hard’ or ‘too overwhelming’. And I’ve heard stories like, “I’m just not good at technology” or “I can’t ever seem to figure out how to launch my new thing,” a million times.  What I want to remind you of today is that what you tell yourself about your work will inform how you experience your work.  If you tell yourself that you suck at writing, you’re going to avoid it like the plague or never put it out there and you’re never going to get better at it.  If you tell yourself that you’re never going to catch up to those further ahead, you won’t because you won’t even begin to try.  If you tell yourself that you’re terrible and inexperienced at managing staff, you’ll avoid dealing with them and make things worse (for you and them).  If you believe that marketing is slimy and overly-complicated, you’ll stay the world’s best-kept secret.  It’s ok to

People will thank you if you created good rules, because otherwise it’s awkward, and you’re leaving everyone to figure them out on their own. ~Priya Parker Over the past few months, tens of thousands of meetings that would otherwise be conducted in boardrooms, coffee shops, libraries and dining room tables are now being held virtually – over Zoom, Google Meets and Microsoft Meetings. And while current technology allows for connection and continued business communications now more than ever, it isn’t without its problems. Hosts who’ve never conducted an online meeting are trying to push in-person ways into virtual rooms. Participants are exhausted, depleted and Zoomed out. Many meetings leave people feeling disconnected and confused. In today’s episode, we get really practice and offer up a ton of tips and strategies for both hosts and participants. Enjoy the episode.  Recommended Resources: Setting digital boundaries Embrace your humanness Zoom Effectively: Discover Ways to Lead Inclusive Meetings and Parti

“The courage to be vulnerable is not about winning or losing, it’s about the courage to show up when you can’t predict or control the outcome.” Brené Brown Yesterday, while cooking my seven thousandth meal in the past few weeks, I was listening to one of my favourite podcasts, NPR Politics. These hosts, who have been in my earbuds for years, are now recording from home – trying to produce a high-quality news show, while toddlers climb up their desk chairs and dogs bark in the background. I laughed yesterday, as one hosts’ dog barked a few too many times and she had to tell Buster to just “shush!” It was a moment of realness that pre-pandemic, would have quickly been edited out. There are have been many more of these moments over the past few weeks, as Late Night Show hosts introduce us to their family members, business owners share challenging behind-the-scenes moments of keeping operations afloat, Bon Appetit chefs teach us how to make gourmet Kraft Dinner, and closer to home, we all get glimpses into how p

Faith includes noticing the mess, the emptiness and discomfort, and letting it be there until some light returns. Anne Lamott As we find ourselves in the middle of this global pandemic; past the shock and awe of those first few weeks of the shutdown and quarantining, yet still months away from anything that looks like 'normal,' I've been thinking about what we can notice about our experiences, right now. The conversations I'm having with friends, family and clients are ones around the future - what we want, what we no longer want and where we want to put our attention and focus when this is done (or close to done). In today's episode, I talk about the importance of noticing: paying attention to the rhythms of our days, to our energy, to where we find ourselves pulled. I believe these quieter moments in this global pause, can be helpful informants for how we make decisions about the future. Recommended Resources: Join LEAD.Well – a new leadership subscription for women who want to be better, br

All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given to us. J.R.R. Tolkien As we all navigate working from home, with partners and kids, and new learning curves – it’s easy to find ourselves feeling foggy, scattered and completely unfocused. Given that most of us are now working from home with more familial demands on our time, it can feel discouraging and futile to carve out focused blocks of time to do your most important work. Here’s where using your margins becomes so very important. Enjoy the episode. Recommended Resources: Join LEAD.Well – a new leadership subscription for women who want to be better, braver leaders.  Pomodoro Technique 3 Reminders for Uncertain Times Sign up to receive my weekly Leadership Letters Join me on Instagram here or on Twitter

In these shorter episodes, I’ve been primarily focusing on how you can better navigate these challenging times. This is the idea of putting our own oxygen masks on first as we can’t give what we don’t have.  Today, I’d like to shift focus and speak to how you can lead others through these times – whether they are co-workers, employees, clients, customers, contractors or even your family members.  We’re all carrying a lot right now, and as uncertainty runs high, it can be easy to find yourself with intrapersonal challenges because everyone is on alert.  This has been a source of many conversations with clients over the past few weeks. As they try to manage their own feelings and actions as a result of the pandemic, they’re also very mindful of the leadership responsibility they have to the people they lead.  So while this list is hardly exhaustive, let me take a moment to share five ways to lead your people through uncertain times. Enjoy the episode. Recommended Resources: Join LEAD.Well – a new leadership sub

Boundaries are a part of self-care. They are healthy, normal, and necessary. Doreen Virtue As we enter wrap up week six of working from home during COVID-19, many of us are looking forward to a weekend free from yet another Zoom meeting. While I'm grateful for what technology has offered us during this time, it isn't without its challenges. Today, we're going to talk about why setting digital boundaries are vital to preserving your well-being and capacity as a leader - especially now. Enjoy the episode and stay safe. Recommended Resources:  Join LEAD.Well – a new leadership subscription for women who want to be better, braver leaders. Sign up to receive my weekly Leadership Letters Join me on Instagram here or on Twitter

Doing nothing is sometimes one of the highest duties of man. G.K. Chesterton Do you worry that you’ve got to make this quarantine count? Are you measuring yourself against what everyone else is getting done while at home? In today’s episode, we continue with our shorter sessions as we navigate COVID-19. We’re going to talk about why there is no test at the end of this and how to let go of the fear of not making this time at home count. Enjoy the episode and stay safe. Recommended Resources: Join LEAD.Well – a new leadership subscription for women who want to be better, braver leaders.  Sign up to receive my weekly Leadership Letters Join me on Instagram here or on Twitter

We can endure almost anything if we are centered, if we have some focus in our life. You can endure if you have an anchor. Renita J. Weems A reminder that for the next little while, I’ll be publishing more often with shorter episodes as a way to talk about and support you during the uncertainty of the times.  Today I want to chat about finding your anchors.  A month into self-isolation I’ve learned that there are a few things I need to do every day to stay grounded. This goes beyond my micro-moves I talked about in the last episode – those were more about what I wanted to accomplish each day.  My anchors are the activities I do my very best to ensure happen every day, no matter what. These are simple things that help me feel more like myself, turn down the volume on any anxiety I’m feeling and remind me that at this moment – I’m ok.  When I do these things, I feel more capable of taking on the to-do items on my list. And when I do these things, I feel better, more hopeful and like I’ve had a mindset reset. L

As I mentioned in last week’s extra episode, for the near foreseeable future, I’ll be coming to you more often - every Monday, Wednesday and Friday to drop a shorter episode with the hope of helping you navigate these new and uncertain times.  Alright, let’s dive in.  It’s Monday, April 13th and we’ve been in self-isolation for a solid month now. I don’t know about you, but my productivity has been all over the place. Some hours I’m raring and ready to go, and others I find myself lethargic and questioning my ability to get even the most basic of tasks done.  I know I’m not alone in this - countless pieces online and memes galore speak to this middle place we find ourselves in - where we’re home more and theoretically have more time (though any fellow parent can agree that we don’t have more time - we now just have more fragmented time).  We’ll talk about productivity more in a future episode, but for now, let me offer one simple strategy that’s helping me with the tension of wanting to get my work d

A quick note to share a podcast update. 

No winter lasts forever; no spring skips its turn. ~ Hal Borland We are navigating new territory as the world collectively deals with the impact of COVID19. Today, as we all continue to orient ourselves to this new 'normal', I want to come in and offer three reminders that I'm using daily (ok, hourly) to cope. These three reminders aren't a one-and-done, we'll be flowing in and out of them regularly, but hopefully, they're helpful touchpoints when the anxiety rears its ugly head or you're struggling to stay focused on anything, except refreshing your Twitter feed (or is that just me). Enjoy the episode. Recommended Resources: Join LEAD.Well – a new leadership subscription for women who want to be better, braver leaders. USE coupon code: communitycare for 30 days free Burnout: the Secret to Unlocking the Stress Cycle Sign up to receive my weekly Leadership Letters Join me on Instagram here or on Twitter

  “The greatness of a community is most accurately measured by the compassionate actions of its members.” ~Coretta Scott King I’m excited to kick-off a brand new series on the podcast all about masterminds, communities and networking for leaders. I’ve been planning this series for a while and given that spring is hopefully right around the corner, it’s a good time to think about getting out into the world and building relationships and deepening connections. And the good news is that all of what we’ll be talking about over the series also translates to the digital world. If you can’t travel, if accessibility is a challenge for you, if you’re a raging introvert or if unexpected forces ie. Coronavirus prohibits going into crowds, we can always leverage the power of online masterminds, communities and networking to support our connection goals.  Today we’re going to talk briefly about all three, and why they matter in your own leadership development path. It’s easy to take connection and community for granted i

Most miscommunications and blow-ups happen because we enter into a tricky conversation without much thought. We’re angry, or frustrated, or overwhelmed – so we fire back words that don’t truly reflect what we feel, nor how we want to show up in the world.  We react first, and process later. We let our emotions rule before we can even stop and consider what we think and feel about the situation, and how we best want to handle it.  As leaders though, we will be faced with tricky and sticky conversations again and again. How we show up to them matters and with practice, we can get better at this. And it always, always starts with this one question.  Enjoy the episode! Recommended Resources: Join LEAD.Well – a new leadership subscription for women who want to be better, braver leaders. The Accelerator Sessions – private accountability coaching Sign up to receive my weekly Leadership Letters Join me on Instagram here or on Twitter

“Learning is not compulsory…neither is survival.” ~ W. Edwards Deming In 2003, I took part in a program called Leadership Calgary (now called the Human Venture Institute). This program was instrumental in my personal and professional development, and in many ways has shaped who I have become.  A few years ago, I decided to revisit the program through an alumni 10-month program offering. Given that it had been 13 years since I spent much time with the concepts, it wasn’t an easy re-entry.  Over the course of the program, I wrestled with feeling like I was on the trailing edge compared to the others in the room who have taken the program more recently and stayed connected along the way.  I felt insecure. I doubted my own intelligence. And many, many times I questioned if it was worth continuing. As such, I held myself back from actively contributing, and stayed in my comfort zone as an observer.  And yet, something kept nudging me to keep going.  At one point, I needed to make a decision about whether to cont

Yeah. No, no, no, wait a minute, I always have tuna on toast. Nothing's ever worked out for me with tuna on toast. I want the complete opposite of on toast. Chicken salad, on rye, untoasted... and a cup of tea.  ~George Costanza, Seinfeld We all have things we’ve believed for so long, we no longer even question their accuracy.  In our minds, they are facts.  Hard, cold truths about who we are, what we’re capable of and what our future holds.  Some of these truths are helpful and reflect our best selves.  Most of them, however, do not.  Listen in as we talk about how to start believing something different.  Recommended Resources: Join LEAD.Well – a new leadership subscription for women who want to be better, braver leaders. Sign up to receive my weekly Leadership Letters Join me on Instagram here or on Twitter Thanks for listening: I want to thank you for listening and to those that have taken the time to review the show. If you like the Rise without Compromise podcast, please consider leaving an honest revie

Can we talk about how hard it is to get feedback? Navigating feedback – both the giving and the receiving – makes up a lot of my coaching work. On any given Tuesday or Friday, clients will come to me looking for guidance on how to make sense of feedback they’ve received, or for help around how to give feedback to a team member or client. In today’s episode, we’re going to focus specifically on receiving feedback, and how to handle all the feelings that come when someone shares their perspective on our work. It’s tricky, it’s scary and it’s something most of us avoid at all costs. So let’s bring it out into the light and talk about it. I’ll start with a story that happened to me a couple of years ago. Trust me, there have been other occasions since, but this particular example encapsulates everything I want to share with you about feedback.  A few years ago, I released a new product into the world called Communicate Like a PRO. It was an idea that had been in my ‘someday’ pile for over a year, and I finally sa

Hello and happy new year!  This episode is dropping at the end of my first week back post-holidays, and I feel like I’m just getting back into the groove. As I said on Instagram earlier this week, give yourself lots of grace and space as you re-enter back to work.  In our last episode, we talked about 10 questions you could ask yourself to close out the year. If you missed it and want to take that reflection time (sidebar, it’s not too late) head here.  Today we’re going to spend time envisioning what 2020 can bring you. If you’re listening to this much later than January 2020, don’t skip this. These questions are valuable at any time of the year.  Once again, I encourage you to give yourself permission to take some time to think these over. Head to a local coffee shop for an hour of uninterrupted time, with your favourite notebook. Don’t rush through it. Taking this time now will help you set up the year ahead in a purposeful, mindful way that can be sustainable.  Trust me, with a lot of personal and client