Speaker 1 (00:00):

[inaudible]

Speaker 2 (00:13):

Hello and welcome Sarah, the female leaders on fire podcast. I’m your host, I’m Nicola Buckley. And I am the coach helping women at the top of the corporate world to find that fire against that passion, that purpose and excitement, so they can have more impact and more influence, um, and have more income as a result, but also be a real force for good to make a real difference in the corporate world. So I’m very excited today because I’ve got a guest on today. We’re joined by the brilliant Emma Langton and Emma is a leadership coach and wellbeing trainer who helps organizations to just really elevate the performance across their teams, focusing on resilience, stress management, and boundaries, and kind of connection. So today we’re going to be talking about something very relevant. So we’ve had a couple of guests on talking about similar things around hybrid working around the changing world of work, because I think it’s really important to understand how as a woman at the top, you can still have that same level of influence and that same level of impact without the corridor conversations about that same connections. So today we’re going to be, she’s going to be sharing her experience and tips of working with leaders and supporting teams within that new unknown, still evolving world of hybrid working and just really making sure that brilliant teams can still work well together and get the best performance from people. So welcome, Emma. It’s brilliant to have you here.

Speaker 3 (01:33):

Oh, thank you so much for inviting me. I can’t wait to have this conversation with you.

Speaker 2 (01:38):

Yes. Very excited. Very excited. So Emma, if you could just start by just sharing a little bit about what you do and how you come to be doing all the brilliant work that you’re doing now with organization.

Speaker 3 (01:49):

Yeah. So in a, in a whistle-stop have, did quite a lot of years, I’m not saying I’m an

Speaker 2 (01:57):

Feel free to say absolutely. Or not say

Speaker 3 (01:59):

I, uh, yeah, 20 years, it’s awful. When you feel 29 on the inside. Really isn’t it. I spent about 20 years in corporate national and international organizations. And I suppose the focus really was on, uh, training and communications. Then I adopted my two girls. It wasn’t just quite as, as quick and flashes that, but I adopted my two girls back in 2007. And, um, it became clear that they had many more issues and needs. Then we were first hold and, um, as every good corporate person has the, I had this lovely career plan where I was going to take this adoption leave. And then I was going to go back into work and I was going to end, it was all gonna look like this and it didn’t look like any of that.

Speaker 2 (02:43):

Yes. And you were on your

Speaker 3 (02:44):

Way and totally. So we didn’t look like any of that. So I ended up taking, um, two years actually a, an adoption leave. And then when I went back to work, um, we discovered that even, you know, that, that our high level demand of the, of the corporate environment was just not fitting with the needs of these kids, but in China. And I was kind of always like, you know, the fixer and the people that everybody went to. So in China, find out about how to help the kids and how to support the kids. That’s when I learned about kind of about attachment, about trauma, about how our early experiences affect how we act in the world and share offers, and then learn about stresses, anxieties and all that. And there was loads and lots of light bulb moments. So I retrained in essence and I changed in, in hypnotherapy, in NLP and coaching and set up my own business.

Speaker 3 (03:34):

Again, sounds like just like that. It seems. Is that just as easy as that? Not quite, but oh, for the last 10 years, I suppose my business has evolved from kind of just doing hypnotherapy for, with just an anxiety with people, because I found, obviously I still have that sort of corporate speak and that corporate mindsets way without realizing I was, I was Nisha and I suppose I was attracting corporate people and that fitted with me because that was what I knew anyway. And so my business then evolved from working with them to coach in them, to them, people asking me to go into their organizations, to talk to their teams about various things, about stresses, about performance and things. And that’s where my whole businesses evolved. And I still obviously do the coach in one-to-one and the coaching within organizations. And then the wellbeing is probably what saved me through. COVID quite honestly, you know, because a lot of people just didn’t have the ability to do that. Focus on any development aspects. Everybody was busy face to face and, and going, what is going on here? So the wealthy,

Speaker 2 (04:42):

Yeah. And the son that I lost about 25 K of business, I think from the shutters coming down and

Speaker 3 (04:47):

A lot. Yeah, massive, massive shifts and changes in contracts and things like that. It’s a bit scary, but you know, deep breaths regroup, all the things that we’re gonna be talking about today, I suppose. And the, the wellbeing bits have really come to the farm. And, um, and I do love it, but I also still love the coach in. And when the coaching has been coming back through, I’ve been like, yeah, you forget how much he loved that stuff. Yeah.

Speaker 2 (05:10):

Yeah. I had about six weeks off probably with my holiday and coming back and just with client timings and hot their holidays. And I had my first coaching one-to-one coaching session back, I think the week before last at all my goal, just, I love it. I was just blown away by just where we started, where we ended up and just like the journey through light bulbs and realizations. And just for that brilliant woman to have the space and the time just to explore things, not be attached to an outcome and just the power of the questions. And yeah, I absolutely, I hugely resonate with that because it was just that reminder for me of this, what I love doing

Speaker 3 (05:48):

Exactly, you know, why, why we do what we do. Exactly.

Speaker 2 (05:51):

So when we talk about wellbeing, so wellbeing, like you said, those is huge shift and change over the last months, an organization, every single person in every single organization at every single level has been affected by lockdown, by the pandemic in a different way. So it’s that, that concept of everyone’s been in on the same, in the same storm, but everyone’s been in their own boat. So experiencing it differently. And as part of that, it’s been brilliant to hear about organizations supporting more and more around wellbeing. But what do you think? I know it’s absolutely huge subject, but we can start to break it down a little bit. Well, what do you think has been the big impacts for wellbeing across organizations? What are you seeing as the key themes that are coming out?

Speaker 3 (06:33):

Okay. So yeah, we’ve, I, you know, I keep saying if we’ve got anything to be thankful for about COVID, it is that, you know, it’s, it’s, it’s enhanced, uh, people’s working ability. It’s kind of almost forced organizations to accept if you act to look at and accept the flexible working patterns and things like that. What also though, w was the two of the biggest things that happened certainly last year in that first phase of COVID, um, was obviously the kids being at home and people trying to do work and to do homeschool and actually everybody working from home. So the two biggest things were the juggling of things and boundaries. Yeah. I used to before COVID had a, um, like workshop that was about kind of work-life balance because obviously I’ve sort of lived and breathed. It went in the business with the kids and the needs and dah, dah, dah, but one section, and I know you’ve done, you’ve done an episode on boundaries, which is actually, which is, and I love, love talking about both.

Speaker 3 (07:32):

So, but we’ll try and just refer back to your episode. But one of the sections within the kind of work-life balance aspect is about boundaries within that. What I ended up doing was I pulled them out into a completely separate workshop, um, because that was one of the biggest things that people were struggling with. And sometimes it was also about sharing with people, some of the things that are kind of, oh, that’s really obvious. Now you mention it, but people were so busy that they’re just not thinking of it. So the work from home, the boundaries, you know, managing children, the school in and things like that. I did put a bit of a different perspective on it as well. Cause I was also a school governor for 10 years. So I was putting a different, wow, just sharing a little bit of a different perspective with people. Um, you know, certainly last year, thankfully schools seem to all be back in and, and even schools got the hang didn’t. They have doing all the remote teaching, um, and things like that. But the other band has been about the lack of connection. And I think lots of people just didn’t realize about the things that you take for granted and just how much connection and going out impacts their wellbeing.

Speaker 2 (08:45):

Yeah, absolutely. I think you’ve summed up brilliantly talking about boundaries, talking about that constant change about juggling and then talking about connection. And for me, connection is such a huge part of powerful leadership. So I love Bernie Brown’s model of leadership and that daring versus the more guarded form of leadership. And for me, connection is a huge part. When you CA when you care about you genuinely care about your team and you genuinely, that leads to that genuine connection that leads to generally that brings you together as a team. So it’s that difference between I’m a leader we’re going here, follow me versus I’m a leader. I think we should go here. What do you think? Um, we’re all gonna do that together. How do we get there together in a feel-good way? And it’s that huge difference? Isn’t it? I, I know for me, it working from home from September last year, my partner was working away.

Speaker 2 (09:39):

So he would leave on a Sunday. And when it was a full lockdown, which includes gyms closing and, you know, shops, closing and restaurants. I didn’t see anyone from, from that Sunday evening. He left through to the Friday when he got back. He’s in medic, he’s worked since he’s in the medical service as well. So for him, he’s seeing patients all day and he’s constantly busy and, you know, he sees nurses and the support team. And for me, he’d get back on a Friday and he’d be just, he wants to just shut down. And I’m like, I haven’t seen anyone a week apart from the dog Walker and that, that very different energy. So how does connection feed into that? The high performance at that bring in teams together in your experience?

Speaker 3 (10:19):

So this is where, this is where I got the first kind of light bulb moments. Like I say, that protects it all back to me, starting to work with this in the beginning, because when, you know, when the girls came and people begin to resonate with this, hopefully, and I, and I know you lived over science. And I always say, I get a little bit geeky about some of the psychology neuroscience type stuff, but you know, what we were told was what we needed to build attachment with these, uh, these children that had come to us because, you know, we’re basically we’re hardwired to, you know, to be tribal, to have people around us. Yeah. Our brains, when we’re born, our brains are wired that way. So then what we need wherever we are, right from early experiences through, into, into our working lives and, and other environments, we need to, um, be able to have those sorts of connections with people around us and the other big aspect that I, that really kind of blew me away, I suppose, with the kids was about safety.

Speaker 3 (11:23):

There’s low to talk now about psychological safety. Yes. But back then, and possibly even before, COVID the, wasn’t quite as much about psychological safety around and that psychological safety is what I usually say to people is like a really deep felt feeling of that. The calm, safe nurse that’s kind of sits right within your car. It’s not just the kind of cognitive, oh, this is all right. Or it’s kind of, oh, it’s safe to cross the road because I can see left and right. Type thing. It’s a deep core feeling that it’s kind of there in your subconscious. And I kind of didn’t get that until the girls came and possibly, because I’ve not experienced too much of uncertainty and, and terms that were not safe, I suppose, or there was always times that were always was sort of within my control, you know, the job wasn’t going well, things were changing in that.

Speaker 3 (12:16):

So what was I going to do? Well, I’ll apply for another job, because like I said, in my intro, I was an action taker and a fixer. So previous to that, I’d never had these feelings of sort of deep uncertainty are on rest are unknown. So those two aspects I think are really, really big. So in order to build those connections with people, you know, we need to show a bit of empathy. We need to, um, you know, we need to do things. There’s a lot of body language. And again, that was missing because, you know, are we on camera? Are we not on camera? Can we turn camera off? Because we’ve got kids in the background, we’ve got people in the background, we’ve not got a set up office environment with people because it was all a bit during the week then and go home stuff.

Speaker 3 (13:04):

There was so much, and it was the shock, I think for people as well, they’re kind of, oh my God stuff, how do we do this? Yeah. So that connection is, is, comes through with conversations, with people being interested in other people. So then the, that, again, the blurring, you know, people were doing the, you know, you go to work and you leave your personal life at the door. Thing has gone. Cause you were at work in your personal life. There were, you know, dogs, cats, kids, all sorts coming into screens. So that, that people were then getting to know people. I had somebody on my podcast and he said that, you know, he’s his team worked seeing him for the real him, instead of him being suited and booted with any shirt and tie on there was seeing him in a t-shirt, you know, with his home pictures in the background. So you get that level of connection where you feel like you’re really getting to know somebody and you know about the kids and you know, about bits of the house or, you know, where they go for a walk or what they did a weekend, which often want a lot. And it’s those sorts of connections. So it’s not just then about the performance and the target.

Speaker 2 (14:14):

Yeah, absolutely for me. But you kind of summarize that, that brilliant share that you’ve just given us just around it’s that shared experience, isn’t it, of this huge thing and the constant shifting and changing. And we also have effectively, we have windows into our colleagues lives and our peers and our bosses lives that we probably haven’t had before. And it, I love what you were saying as well about that need for safety and connection is an element of that. Because if you go back to Tony Robbins, the two biggest fears, two biggest fears is that we’re not lovable and that we’ll end up on our own. And obviously from the nearest science point of view, the brain is looking for certainty is looking for consistency is looking for that same prediction response for 18 months. I mean, now it’s a little more certain, but for 18 months we didn’t have that.

Speaker 2 (15:00):

I’m on my fourth wedding date, for example, I’ve, I’ve got clients that work with me that a year into a job that I’ve only just met their boss properly. Yeah. No huge things like this, that there just wasn’t that certainty. And actually that connection in a different way is helping to at least give some of that back and feel you feel part of a collective experience. I do think as well, there is a, there will be like almost like a collective trauma trauma with a small team, but this everyone’s experienced at a different level. And everyone’s, you know, some people have been on Thurlow for a long time. Some people lost their jobs. Some people have gone into a new job and never met their team. Businesses have had to change very quickly. So everyone’s experienced children, not, you know, missing out on a year of school effectively or not going to nursery for a year. It’s all those different formative stages. And everyone has been impacted in some way. So when we talk about wellbeing now, and we talked, I love how you talked about connection. What can we be doing to help teams when we’re, we’re leading? And we’re, we’ve got a big team, but it’s also a remote team, or maybe there’s people that are in and out the office. And it’s all this different combinations. It’s the hybrid way of working? What can leaders do to really support their teams in this new hybrid working?

Speaker 3 (16:17):

So obviously it’s about, you know, making, taking the time to get to know the people in your team been it’s been interested and, you know, I’m quite sure that, you know, there might be some of your listeners that are already feeling really tired. Um, you know, I’ve just been kind of working nonstop, the boundaries that have been blurred however much, they’ve tried to sort those out that they’re kind of going off for goodness sake, come out. You know, that’s just another thing on my to-do list. However, it’s, you know, it’s almost about kind of being strategic, that if you take the time to get to know your team or get to know your people, then it’s gonna pay off in the long run. And the way that it will pay off is because they will feel, you know, if you share little bits about you and this can even be done on internal things, like, you know, like snap, slack, and, um, all other internal systems teams and things like that, where there’s internets and messaging systems about, you know, share bits of your, uh, share bits of your weekend or show you, you know, share a picture of your favorite walk and things like that, because then people are sharing bits and pieces about, about themselves and about their own lives.

Speaker 3 (17:24):

But when they’re being asked to share it, if they, it also naturally gives that sense and that feeling that people are interested. And when we, when somebody is interested in us, you know, and it’s very much like that kind of, well, you know, tell me about that. And people like, oh, you re you know, he really wants to know about me, won’t you care? So even doing things like that, no matter how kind of big the team is. So it isn’t about remembering everybody’s. I mean, it helps remembering everybody’s child’s name and their age and what it was that was due in, and obviously remembering, you know, previous conversations and things like that. But then there’s ways to do collective sharing that build those connections as well, to then sort of create bits of you could create groups of kind of like-minded people, you know, with those that liked to do cycle rides, those that, you know, that swim those, that want book club, those that, you know, were in interested in or whatever is, you know, the latest TV program or of various bits and pieces like that.

Speaker 3 (18:26):

Yeah. So then, you know, then you start to sort of group things together with that. And again, that’s building connections and, and breaking down those connections into, into smaller ways. But what you’re also doing is, you know, showing that you are interested, then when you do that, you’ve also then got opportunities to be able to talk to people about things, to be able to build on that share or their information, either information out. Did you go on a walk that, you know, the weekend, you know, and I saw that you did, or haven’t seen a picture of it from your walks recently, so that when you’re having the one-to-one type conversations, you’ve got things that you can refer back to because one of the biggest things, and I really hope that this message is out there to all of your listeners now, because it has been said such a lot, I think, through COVID. So I’m hoping it’s out there, but you know, you never know is that, you know, when we’re saying to somebody, how are you when we’ve got this remote working and the, almost the kind of disconnect a bit when we say to somebody, how are you obviously we’ve got the good old British, I’m fine.

Speaker 2 (19:35):

Yeah. It’s one of my pet peeves when you fight and you really know what you want to rip your boss’s head off and the dogs in the house and your husband’s annoyed you and beyond, but I’m going to say, I’m fine.

Speaker 3 (19:49):

Yeah. You’ve got techies shows and they’re going come. You just, it there’s no, just about that job that you’ve asked me to do. Um, yeah. Um, so yeah, there’s the, I’m fine. The good British I’m fine. And what I, you know, what I’ve been saying? And I know a lot of other people that, that advocate, the kind of mental health aspect is to always ask twice. Okay. So, so you go through it past the first kind of, I’m fine. And then you can do a bit of chit chat, obviously, you know, haven’t seen a picture or what walk did you do well to do things? How are the kids settling in at school, whatever it is, and then go, and how are you really so powerful and then sit with the silence, you know? But that really builds the connection then, because that means people again, feel, oh, somebody, somebody really cares that, you know, the really mean that it’s not just that passing welcoming phrase, you are right. Type thing, you know, fine move on.

Speaker 2 (20:46):

Yeah. But you’re creating space for them. Aren’t you allowing them to whatever comes up. And actually when you were speaking, I just thought about something that Bernie brown talks about, as you mentioned on her podcast that she does with her team. So very busy team, busy organization doing lots of amazing work in the world. And they have like a three-word check-in. So the three-word check-in is, and they’ve kind of set some ground rules for it. So be really truthful on, on S see what comes up for you. You know, there’s no need to hide anything, safe space judgment-free and three words that just really reflect how you’re feeling in that moment. And sometimes they might be hugely positive and energizing. Sometimes they might be a bit more restrictive and you might just be coming from a place of feeling, quite tired and a bit to police it and any, or all of those are okay, because they’re simply how you’re feeling. They’re not the measure of you. They don’t define you. And I love, I love that approach to that really simple. It’s very, very quick. So, you know, as soon as we, as soon as you get people to introduce themselves as always that you takes longer or check in with them, or

Speaker 3 (21:47):

Project update always takes a little bit longer, doesn’t it in team meetings. But that for me, was that very simple, powerful, and I loved what you said about, you know, ask twice, but how, you know, what’s really going on. And the other part of that for me, would be what I love about what I teach in coaching leadership. It’s like role model, role model, who you want to, you know, how you want to be seen and how you want others to follow in your footsteps and your, if you’re shining the light on this unknown way, as a woman in a more male dominated industry, or as a woman at the very, very top, and you’re on this path that you’re treading on for the first time, and you’re leading the way role model, the behaviors that are important to you that, you know, have helped you, that may be more feminine than masculine or more different in that organization actually helps you to stand out.

Speaker 3 (22:33):

And part of that can be role modeling. It’s okay to have a day where you’re not feeling you’re going to take on the world. It’s okay to have a day where you take off your clothes a little bit, and you just, I’m not feeling great today, but I’m here. I’m going to do the best that I can. And I’d love your help with that. Absolutely. It’s. Yeah, absolutely. And it’s about that level of acceptance again, and people feeling that they can go to people at any level, rarely of the organization, not the kind of, you know, like, oh my God stands for attention. It’s the boss type thing. And, uh, you know, and be able to say how they are, because what then comes after that is not also that you’ve got people saying how they are, then they will also say, if they’re struggling, they will also say if there are issues, they will also come forward with ideas. If it’s things like, you know, there’s this, there’s this process or this project. And I think we’re going to have a problem, or I think we can do it faster, or I think all those sorts of things that people are going to be able to then come forward with. But obviously primarily when we’re talking about wellbeing, we want people to come forward, you know, with how it is that they are, that it has that positive knock on effect for the organization as a whole as well. Yeah.

Speaker 2 (23:43):

Cause you really create in their own environment of chief and honesty, aren’t you. And if you know, it’s safe and judgment free, it’s, I’m going to put this idea out there, but actually I’m a bit scared and I might, they might say stupid or I’m wrong, but actually I know it’s quite safe, so I’m going to do it anyway. And you get past all those barriers around your own inner critic in a nagging way at you. And you’re like, well, I feel quite safe. So like you talked about that importance of psychological safety. And I think the way that you ask those two questions about how are you, it’s almost like we don’t have the opportunity so much first sit down with a cup of type chats. This isn’t your one-to-one. This is just to check in with you. It’s almost that virtual cupper isn’t it of just sit down and just, let’s just talk and let’s see what was coming up for you and how you are.

Speaker 2 (24:28):

So we’ve focusing on wellbeing and hybrid working when we first spoke as well about being on the podcast today, you mentioned that there’s some little ways that you can sense that maybe people need a bit more help or some little things to watch out for, with that remote workers. We’re not seeing them day in, day out. We’re not seeing if they’re coming into the office at a different time or not seeing if they’re maybe, you know, a little bit more reactive than they normally are. So we’re not seeing that all the time. So what are some little hints and tips that leaders can look for to really just maybe have some warning lights that some will maybe need a little bit more help with our wellbeing?

Speaker 3 (25:01):

Okay. So, you know, ordinarily we would pick up on, you know, things like tone of voice and body language. They went to somebody in the office, you would notice that somebody is being really quiet, perhaps have maybe not joined in with bits of Phantom and the chit chats, you know, um, uh, around the water cooler or the coffee machine or whatever. We can transfer that to also kind of, you know, noticing those quietness, uh, from somebody, you know, maybe, maybe it’s on a team call or maybe they’ve not been, you know, they’ve not answered maybe a couple of emails or a couple of bits of communications. So notice areas of sort of quietness from somebody. Um, and it’s the quietness, isn’t just about sort of volume of our conversation. So that there’s other ways that, that quietness, if you like, can kind of come through, then there are other aspects.

Speaker 3 (25:53):

And it’s about thinking about how you transpose these things that you wouldn’t normally look out for in the office to, you know, to remotely. So again, you know, we get things like body language, you know, is somebody kind of sit in slumped down in the chair or are they kind of sit in, you know, sitting back arms folded. Sometimes arms folded is a nice, comfy way to sit, but sometimes it’s a bit more tense than it’s a bit more people who are a bit more sort of backed off from, from the situation or the circumstances. So this body language type things like that, you know, it might be that they’re looking a bit sort of tight shoulders and things. It might be the facial expression looks a bit tense and then, you know, facial expressions, uh, huge sitting there laughing, um, this is why I’ll do a podcast and not video people and, and why it barely, you know, advocate a coach rather than a therapist because facial expressions just tell me everything, you know?

Speaker 2 (26:47):

Yeah. I get that

Speaker 3 (26:50):

People, you know, people have said to me, well, Emma just gave me a look. So then I knew what I had to do. Um, but you know, for some people that can be a little bit more, a little bit more guarded. And, um, so it’s watching for things like, you know, the facial expressions and things like that that are all coming through turn of Feis as well, you know, were both quite kind of, you know, upbeat, the voices are quite sing-songy and things like that. But honestly, if I was fed up and it was pouring down with rain and, um, you know, and I was feeling really tired, then voices do go flatter lower, and you have less of that kind of up and down, less of the sing song aspect of things. So those can be, um, just a few really of the little bits that you can do. And you can do that on the phone, on video, you know, as well as some of those first or first bits and even picking up when people are sort of quiet on email and quiet on, on coming back to you about, uh, you know, just messaging, however people are using messaging type things you can pick up on all of those things. So you don’t even have to see somebody video well, not to be able to pick some of those things up.

Speaker 2 (28:00):

Yeah. I do actually do some coaching now where, or I do at the beginning of a coaching session. Just I get zoom fatigue. Yeah. I’m on an, I just, you know, just offering to turn the camera off if they want to. So I get quite sensitive hearing, but I also get my eyes get quite dry so I can still pick up their energy. I can still actually, it tunes me into their tone even more. It’s almost like a different, your senses vary and kind of reflect on what’s what’s available. So, yeah. So just coming to the end now, is there a final message on wellbeing for leaders that you would like to share with the audience? Because I think you’ve covered some apps that you brilliant stuff today.

Speaker 3 (28:37):

You know, I think there’s loads, you know, connection and boundaries, connection and boundaries. There’s loads that we can put it, that we can say are important qualities for leaders. But for me, I think those are the ones that, that people struggle with. So making sure that we’ve got those connections, making sure that you know how to have the conversations with people, you know, they ask twice. It’s just one of the things I often joke about kind of going, I feel sometimes like I’m somebody out of a James Bond movie, you know, where I go, I have ways of making you talk because there are ways that we can phrase things that we can do turn of voice and all sorts of stuff like that, that I often work with people with, but, you know, to create those connections and to, you know, to be able to help people and support people in that kind of way, and just make sure that you are modeling those boundaries because somebody is always going to want to work harder, wanted to please, you know, want to be seen as the person that does everything. It is about refer back to everything that you’ve said in your episode, but make sure you’re modeling those boundaries.

Speaker 2 (29:49):

Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. I just think role modeling is so important as a leader. Just, you know, you it’s all flows from, you know, people looking up to you, it’s just like, be an example, you know, you can’t be who you can’t see. So be that person that they can see and be the role model that, you know, they want to be. Absolutely. So final three questions. So I’d like to close all needs. Um, so he’s quite quick fire. So first one is who has been a leader that has really inspired you.

Speaker 3 (30:18):

Okay. So a guy called George MCI was I’m a director I worked for at w BC. Um, he was a brilliant leader, vulnerable, honest, personable, loved and respected. What many people didn’t know was that he did have flaws that I kind of helped him out on, like, he was terrible at remembering people’s names. And I mentioned he was briefed, but I want people to know that I serve respected that guy, but he still had, he still had some flaws and that was okay.

Speaker 2 (30:45):

Yeah. Yeah. It didn’t, it didn’t make you love him or want to follow him, be inspired by many lads. Know exactly people. Yeah. What about a book that has changed or, well, that you’d recommend. Okay.

Speaker 3 (30:57):

Hey, this is not necessarily, um, a book for leaders, a book for leaders. I’m going to, you know, I’m following your footsteps I suppose, is, is that I would send everybody off to Bernay brown, uh, categorically. But the one that changed my life and really sparked my interest is one by an American psychologist called Bruce Perry. And he wrote, it’s a service of books, but it’s called the boy who was raised as a dog. And it’s about what happens to a young child when it’s traumatized and how people can come through that. And it was just, it doesn’t, it’s not as hard reason as it sounds, but it was, it was just really poignant for me.

Speaker 2 (31:37):

Yeah. Wow. And the final one is what does find your fire mean to you? So,

Speaker 3 (31:42):

And Jeff, I have is about finding that thing that gets you out of bed in the morning and often when I’m even when I’m struggling or when I’m working with other people, it is about going back to your vision. You know what, if you, if you got a bed thinking, oh, I can’t do this anymore. And yet you get up the next day and do it all over again, because that fire has been reignited the next morning. That’s brilliant. But if you get up thinking, oh my God, I’ve got to do this. Then actually revisit your vision, you know, which, and which is the goals, the dreams, and all the things that you want to do in life. Yeah.

Speaker 2 (32:18):

Yeah. I love that. We’ve actually just, I’ve just interviewed another brilliant lady called McKayla is we’re talking about exactly that. So yeah, so, so powerful. And where can people find you?

Speaker 3 (32:28):

So I have a website, Emma, linkedin.com. I’m on LinkedIn and my Lankton Twitter. And I have my own podcast as well, which you are going to be guests, which is called lessons for leaders.

Speaker 2 (32:43):

Well, thank you for today. Abba that I just, I had a couple of goosebump moments. I just love that twice. So powerful. So simple yet. So powerful. So thank you so much for today.

Speaker 3 (32:55):

Been an absolute pleasure. I could’ve talked to you for ages, but I really hope the listeners get something from it. So thank you so much.

Speaker 2 (33:02):

I’m sure they will. Thank you.

Speaker 1 (33:04):

[inaudible].