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Women Taking the Lead

The Women Taking the Lead podcast is a resource for women leaders, allies, and organizations looking to promote more women into senior leadership. Episode formats include specific leadership challenges, "on-air" coaching with women leaders, and interviews with internal talent and organizational development leaders. Women Taking the Lead inspires women to overcome self-doubt and lead with confidence, integrity and a sense of humor.
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Now displaying: October, 2017
Oct 30, 2017

Giovanna passionately advocates for women to stop settling for less in all areas of their lives! She began her spiritual and personal development journey over 20 years ago and now acts as a catalyst for the transformation of the mind and the belief systems that hold you back and sabotage your life, relationships and businesses. She calls her approach a form of Radical Self Love & Responsibility; which brings forward more energy, presence, authenticity and visibility in the people she works with.

Click to tweet: .@sherisespodcast is sharing her story to inspire you on Women Taking the Lead https://womentakingthelead.com/239 #inspiration

Playing Small Moment

Giovanna found herself overwhelmed with grief in her hotel room in Mexico after awaking from a nightmare. A recent breakup, paired with the death of her mother, had Giovanna in despair, imagining herself dying of a broken heart. A peace came over Giovanna when she put her arms around herself and realized what she had to do to save herself.

Style of Leadership

Giovanna leads by example. The reason she is a coach is so that she can share her life experiences and what she has learned.

What Are You Excited About?

Giovanna is currently writing a book, and it is making her giddy every time she sits down to write it.

Current Business Challenge

As visible as Giovanna is, she feels she needs to up it a notch. She wants to get out in front of more audiences and share her story to more people.

Leadership Practice

Giovanna calls in something greater to work through her when she is working with clients. If she pretends to have all the answers, it doesn’t often work out the way it should.

Advice For Younger Self

“Find love inside yourself.”

Inspirational Quote

“You’re not doing this alone.”

Links

Website: www.sherisespodcast.com
Instagram @she_rises_podcast
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/sherisespodcast/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/sherisespodcast

Thank You to Our Sponsors

Zebralove Web SolutionsYour website tells a story about your business! At Zebralove Web Solutions, Milly and her team are going to make sure your website tells the story you want your customers to hear. Connect with Milly at zebralovewebsolutions.com to create the impression you want to make!

Resources

Private Facebook CommunityChat, share and collaborate with other women in the community!

Accomplished: How to Go from Dreaming to DoingA simple, step by step system that gives you the foundation and structure to take your goals and make them happen.

The Accomplished Community: A community of entrepreneurial Type A women uniting to achieve their biggest goals with confidence, integrity and a sense of humor.

Subscribe to Women Taking the Lead

If you enjoyed this episode subscribe in iTunes, Stitcher RadioGoogle Play Music or iHeart Radio and never miss out on inspiration and community!

Oct 26, 2017

What can I share with you that has been going on in my world? Well, for one, there are going to be some changes to my website. WomenTakingTheLead.com is going to get a whole new look and feel soon. I’m really excited about this because the changes are more reflective of my brand and what I am trying to accomplish with Women Taking the Lead.

If I haven’t shared already I’ve also begun reading A Course in Miracles. Or I should say I’m doing A Course in Miracles. It is a very interactive read, mentally, physically, emotionally and spiritually. As of the release of this episode on October 26, 2017 I am 36 days into the course. It has been both challenging and freeing.

While overall I can acknowledge I’m a pretty positive person, I have become aware of how critical I am of myself and others. While this awareness is a bit startling it’s a good thing because enables me to let go of being so critical.

Given some of the things I’ve been dealing with recently and what’s been going on in our society in the past few months I don’t think it was a coincidence that I took the opportunity finally to begin A Course in Miracles.

If you have done any part of the course or you are thinking about it I would love to hear from you. I don’t think this course is meant to be done on your own and I’m seeking a variety of perspectives. I’ve gained so much from others sharing with me what their experience has been, either the insights they’ve gained or questions they still have.

Lastly, what’s going on for me is in the next few weeks I am offering 30-Minute Calls to the members of the Women taking the Lead Private Facebook Group to chat about anything. It could be for coaching, for advice, to ask me anything and everything, etc. This call is for you, my only questions will be, “How can I be of service to you?” If you want in, head over to womentakingthelead.com/group to join the facebook group and schedule your call.

Living “The Four Agreements

I’ve got a new series of 100% Jodi for you and it’s based on one of the most impactful books I have ever read, The Four Agreements. Last May I published a 100% Jodi episode titled, 9 Places I Found What I (Didn't Realize) I Needed. In that episode I shared 9 books that came into my life and changed it for the better.

Chronologically, The Four Agreements came into my life second but it is the book I recommend most when people ask what book I would recommend to others. The reason for this is I believe the biggest thing holding us back in our lives and our businesses is our stress reactions. Our stress reactions are created by our perception of self, others and the world at large.

Quite simply, the teachings in The Four Agreements enable you to change your perception so you don’t get stressed out by what’s happening. Because you don’t get stressed out and thus shut down, overreact or pretend things are okay when they are not, you can bring forth your highest self in any situation.

The Four Agreements are powerful because they are simple.

On Saturday, October 14, 2017 I had the pleasure of attending an event in Portland, Maine titled The Four Agreements for a Better Life. The speakers were don Miguel Ruiz, the author of The Four Agreements, and his sons don Miguel Ruiz, Jr. and don Jose Ruiz.

In this and the next few 100% Jodi episodes I’m going to share with you the notes I took that evening and some of my thoughts around the material.

The Most Important Agreement

Don Miguel Ruiz, Sr. started the evening declaring the most important agreement is “Be Impeccable with Your Word.” It is the most important agreement because your word creates your reality.

You have created the story of yourself so if you don’t like the story you have about yourself you can change it. You don’t have to be the current version of you anymore if you don’t want to.

You are an artist with your words. The art you create is the story of your life. It is not real, you made it up, so you can change it at any time.

Don Miguel Ruiz, Sr. issued a request to help him change the world. The way you change the world is by changing your own world. You change your world by changing the way you speak, specifically by no longer using words against yourself.

  1. Stop punishing yourself for the mistakes you believe you made.
  2. Stop attacking (and thus trying to control) other people.
  3. Respect yourself; respect other people. When you respect yourself and others you find peace.

Life is Easy. We Make it Difficult.

We make life difficult by adding drama to it.

You will change your world by changing the way you treat yourself and your physical body.

It doesn’t matter what others do. What is important is for you to enjoy your life.

What really struck me in what don Miguel Sr. shared is that it was a fantastic compliment to the conversation Libby Bunten and I had in last week’s On-Air Coaching Call episode. Libby and I recorded our call the day before this event occurred so I went into this event with our conversation fresh in my mind.

In that episode, Libby shared how her old story of who she is, specifically who she is for other people, was holding her back in her business and keeping her from being her highest self in her life. Not only was it keeping her from being her highest self but she could see how it was keeping those around her from being their highest selves as well.

Before our coaching call Libby had already started crafting a new story for herself, however, she was having difficulty living into it. We were able to identify some things that were holding her back from truly embracing her new empowering story and some practices that would help her to more quickly integrate it into her life.

The Stories that Hold You Back

My clients come to me for various reasons but what is always holding them back is a story they have about who they are, who other people are, how things should be done, etc.

These stories are the words that they repeat to themselves and keep them imprisoned in their current reality. Here are some examples:

Stories and words that keep you from trusting others

“If you want something done right you’ve got to do it yourself.”

“I’m the only one who can do this.”  

“I can’t trust others to do this the way it needs to be done.”

You cannot grow in your business or your career or your life without beginning to trust others. It may sound like an insurmountable hurdle but there are ways to build trust slowly so you can get to a place where you can allow other people opportunities to grow as well.

It can be done. It has been done. It could be yours.

Stories and words that devalue your abilities

“I’m not the expert.”

“I’ve only been in business for X amount of years.”

“My degree is in another field.”

“I don’t have the letters after my name.”

“Other people have so much more experience than I do.”

Let’s be clear, more experience, degrees and letters do not necessarily mean better results. In fact, when I challenged one of my clients on this belief she owned up that some of her clients had hired her after hiring a so-called “experienced expert” to come in and fix what the experienced person had done.

What society considers valuable is not necessarily what produces results. Please don’t devalue what you can do for your clients and customers. They need you to help them so be more confident so they can put their trust in you.

Stories and words that give your power away to others

“If I speak up for myself I’ll hurt this person.”

“There’s no point in speaking up. They’re not going to listen to what I have to say.”

“There’s nothing I can do.”

“Why bother, it’s not going to make a difference.”

When we give our power away, when we stop speaking up for ourselves, for what we believe and we stop trying to make a difference we mentally become a victim to our circumstances. I’m not got to water this down. This mentality has catastrophic consequences to our health, work, relationships, finances, and thus destroys our experience of joy and peace.

To Sum it Up…

There is NO FREEDOM in any of the stories I just mentioned and these stories attack who you really are, your highest self. They disrespect you and they disrespect others.

The moral of this episode is your words create your experience. Watch the words that flow through your mind and the words that come out of your mouth.

If you find the words that you think or speak upset you or limit what’s possible for you, you have a choice.

You can keep going on the way you’re going and hope things get better or you can challenge your words and choose new words that empower you.

“Be Impeccable with Your Word” is the most important agreement because your word creates your reality.

30-Minute Calls for the Private Facebook Group

If you want to talk through any of this here is the reminder that in the next few weeks I am offering 30-Minute Calls to the members of the Women taking the Lead Private Facebook Group to chat about anything. It’s not limited to talking about this episode. It could be for coaching, for advice, to ask me anything and everything, etc. This call is for you, my only questions will be, “How can I be of service to you?” If you want in, head over to womentakingthelead.com/group to join the facebook group and schedule your call.

As always, I hope this was of value to you and here’s to your success!

Thank You to Our Sponsors!

Zebralove Web SolutionsYour website tells a story about your business! At Zebralove Web Solutions, Milly and her team are going to make sure your website tells the story you want your customers to hear. Connect with Milly at zebralovewebsolutions.com to create the impression you want to make!

Resources

Private Facebook CommunityChat, share and collaborate with other women listening to the podcast!

Accomplished: How to Go from Dreaming to DoingA simple, step by step system that gives you the foundation and structure to take your goals and make them happen.

The Accomplished Community: A community of entrepreneurial Type A women uniting to achieve their biggest goals with confidence, integrity and a sense of humor.

Oct 23, 2017

Sari de la Motte is the CEO and founder of FORTE. Sari has trained extensively with an internationally recognized authority in nonverbal communication and leads seminars based in nonverbal communication strategies throughout the United States. Sari has spoken for, and works with, several members of the Inner Circle of Advocates, an invitation-only group consisting of the top 100 trial attorneys in the United States. She’s been a featured columnist for Oregon Criminal Defense Lawyer’s Magazine, Oregon Defense Attorney, and for Washington State Association of Justice.

Click to tweet: .@SariDLM is sharing her story to inspire you on Women Taking the Lead https://womentakingthelead.com/238 #inspiration

Playing Small Moment

Sari decided to expand recently. It was the wrong timing and it didn’t work out. Sari had a crisis of faith and questioned all of her decisions. What did she do wrong? Is this the end? In those moments it was easy for Sari to overlook her success and underplay her good moments.

Style of Leadership

Sari likes to take charge and do things now, apologizing later. This strategy has gotten her to places she has wanted to go, but she also had to learn the opposite side of it. Sari has learned that people tend to put themselves in boxes, when you should realize your range and give yourself permission to expand.

What Are You Excited About?

Sari has her first book deal! Her upcoming book, titled “From Hostages to Volunteers,” discusses jurors and the hostage situation they are brought into. Jurors are expected to use logic, reason and evidence to make decisions, yet they often don’t even want to be there.

Current Business Challenge

When faced with a situation that doesn’t go as planned, women tend to withdraw and figure out problems alone. Sari was challenged with this recently when her expansion didn’t work out. Instead of turning inward, we should be reaching out and asking others for help.

Leadership Practice

Self care is very important to Sari. Each morning, she does Julia Cameron’s Morning Pages, three pages written to drain the brain. Your fears, plans—or even random thoughts—all get dumped onto these pages, leaving your brain clear and ready to focus on the day.

Advice For Younger Self

Sari would tell her younger self, and her current self, to be more patient.

Inspirational Quote

“People won’t remember what you said, but they’ll remember what they felt.” ~Maya Angelou

Links

Website: www.nonverbalforte.com
Website: www.attorneywhisperer.com
Free eBook: www.nonverbalforte.com/pumpupthevolume
Job Seeker Offer: www.nonverbalforte.com/showup
Twitter: @SariDLM
Facebook: www.facebook.com/nonverbalFORTE
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/saridlm

Thank You to Our Sponsors

ThirdLove: Tired of compromising comfort, ThirdLove® set out to create a better bra. Armed with research and a lot of opinions, they scrapped the standard bra cup size molds—literally broke them!—and developed their own half-cup sizes based on real women’s measurements. Check out ThirdLove today!

Zebralove Web SolutionsYour website tells a story about your business! At Zebralove Web Solutions, Milly and her team are going to make sure your website tells the story you want your customers to hear. Connect with Milly at zebralovewebsolutions.com to create the impression you want to make!

Resources

Private Facebook CommunityChat, share and collaborate with other women in the community!

Accomplished: How to Go from Dreaming to DoingA simple, step by step system that gives you the foundation and structure to take your goals and make them happen.

The Accomplished Community: A community of entrepreneurial Type A women uniting to achieve their biggest goals with confidence, integrity and a sense of humor.

Subscribe to Women Taking the Lead

If you enjoyed this episode subscribe in iTunes, Stitcher RadioGoogle Play Music or iHeart Radio and never miss out on inspiration and community!

Oct 19, 2017

In the last On Air Coaching call there was more consulting going on. I chatted with Terri DeCoster about technology because that was the obstacle for her in her business.

In this call I’m chatting with Libby Bunten of Arbonne International and we had a coaching call which is more typical for me in my business. The issue we addressed was the conflict that arises when we are developing ourselves personally, professionally, mentally and spiritually and the people around us are not yet comfortable with the changes that are happening.

I want to underscore we’ve all been on both sides of this scenario whether we realize it or not. We’ve been the person trying to make positive changes in our lives and are experiencing resistance from the people around us and we’ve been the person resisting change in others.

No one thinks to themselves, “wow, good things are happening for my friend and I wish that weren’t the case.” It’s more a though like, “we used to think the same way about things and now you’re looking at things differently.” Or, you used to always be available for me and now you’re busy doing other things.”

This change in relationship dynamics is natural, it is happening all around us, and in the conversation you’re about to hear there is no judgment about how others should or should not be.

Libby and I covered topics like identifying and letting go of old stories, the space between letting go of an old story and taking on a new story; and once that new story is identified, integrating it so it becomes a natural part of our identity.

If you know you’ve been bumping up against some old stories that keep playing themselves out and are holding you back or if you’ve started to move toward a new empowering story but it’s creating some tension in your relationships, this is a great episode for you to listen to.

Libby and I discussed:

  • Connecting people through leadership.
  • Deepening connections in spirituality.
  • Loving people where they are at.
  • Showing up and being yourself.
  • Replacing your childhood blueprint [old stories].
  • Being placed in a leadership role.

I really want to acknowledge Libby for getting so vulnerable. It was not easy for her but she knew it would be good for her and her business, and for those who would listen to this episode as well. And, Libby sent me a text an hour or so after we finished recording because she was experiencing an exposure hang over. I spoke about my own experience with an exposure hangover in a 100% Jodi episode regarding an episode I did on my spirituality.

What happened was Libby’s old story started playing itself out and she was worried about the potential negative impact this episode would have on others. When we talked it through and looked at this episode through the lens of her new story of her leadership and her success would ripple out and benefit all of those around her all the internal conflict and worry went away.

That’s how powerful our stories are and why we need to be aware of them and also have people in our lives who won’t let us play small, who won’t let us live by our old stories. I promised Libby I would call her on it if she showed up as her old story and she gave me a chance to keep my word within hours.

Libby and I hope this was of value to you and here’s to your success!

Links

The Energy Leadership Assessment

Work With Jodi

https://www.facebook.com/libbybuntenaic

https://www.instagram.com/libbylula/

https://twitter.com/Libbylula79

You can reach Jodi at jodi@womentakingthelead.com

Thank You to Our Sponsors!

Zebralove Web SolutionsYour website tells a story about your business! At Zebralove Web Solutions, Milly and her team are going to make sure your website tells the story you want your customers to hear. Connect with Milly at zebralovewebsolutions.com to create the impression you want to make!

Resources

Private Facebook CommunityChat, share and collaborate with other women listening to the podcast!

Accomplished: How to Go from Dreaming to DoingA simple, step by step system that gives you the foundation and structure to take your goals and make them happen.

The Accomplished Community: A community of entrepreneurial Type A women uniting to achieve their biggest goals with confidence, integrity and a sense of humor.

Oct 16, 2017

Melissa Hereford has been teaching people how to negotiate for over 22 years. Through her workshops, Melissa teaches women skills to get ahead AND get along, to confidently ask for what you want without worrying that you’ll be called bossy or too aggressive. 

A lot of women feel powerless like "they don't have a choice" in life situations. She’s here to show that you have all of the tools already inside you to make shifts in your everyday agreements that will change your life. 

Click to tweet: .@mel_hereford is sharing her story to inspire you on Women Taking the Lead https://womentakingthelead.com/237 #inspiration

Playing Small Moment

In her role as a Vice President, Melissa let her fears and insecurities stand in her way. She watched as this company lost customers and revenue and knew how to make changes, but was too afraid to speak up. If she had spoken up and given her team the reasons why and ideas to move forward, she could have really made an impact.

Style of Leadership

Earlier in her career, Melissa but a team from scratch and filled it with like-minded individuals. As her team grew, Melissa had to really look at each person and understand their motivations and strengths so she could help them act and work more effectively.

What Are You Excited About?

Melissa is so excited about being able to bring her negotiating skills to women, outside of a corporate setting. Most of the time, people don’t have access to these types of trainings unless their employer purchases them for the company. Through Negotiate with Confidence, Melissa is teaching women how to ask for things that they wouldn’t normally ask for — and they are actually getting them!

Current Business Challenge

Melissa is Type-A and often finds herself striving for perfection. Her biggest challenge relating to her personality is her fear of failing. If details are missed, Melissa has a tendency to beat herself up and she is really trying to learn how to let that stuff go.

Leadership Practice

Something Melissa had to learn to do was trust her team. She makes sure to give them a change to do their job, without asking them — or letting them tell her — the nitty gritty details that she really doesn’t need to know.

Advice For Younger Self

“Take time off. Do not work every day. You need time to recharge.”

Inspirational Quote

“The only thing to fear is fear itself.” ~FDR

“You can’t be that kid standing at the top of the slide, overthinking it. You have to go down the shoot.” ~Tina Fey

Links

Website: https://MelissaHereford.com
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/melissa-hereford-170a063/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/mel_hereford
Negotiate With Confidence: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCBb_nSImUPvzxDFVRq9Bt4g
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/negotiatewithconfidence/
Email: melissa@melissahereford.com 

Thank You to Our Sponsors

 

Zebralove Web SolutionsYour website tells a story about your business! At Zebralove Web Solutions, Milly and her team are going to make sure your website tells the story you want your customers to hear. Connect with Milly at zebralovewebsolutions.com to create the impression you want to make!

Resources

Private Facebook CommunityChat, share and collaborate with other women in the community!

Accomplished: How to Go from Dreaming to DoingA simple, step by step system that gives you the foundation and structure to take your goals and make them happen.

The Accomplished Community: A community of entrepreneurial Type A women uniting to achieve their biggest goals with confidence, integrity and a sense of humor.

Subscribe to Women Taking the Lead

If you enjoyed this episode subscribe in iTunes, Stitcher RadioGoogle Play Music or iHeart Radio and never miss out on inspiration and community!

Oct 12, 2017

This episode is going to be short and sweet and you’re going to find out why pretty quickly.

One of my favorite shows of all time is The West Wing. I loved the quick pace, the witty banter, the thoughtful approach to complex issues, and the relationships of the characters. They were good people doing their best and occasionally, with good intentions, messing up.

There are many things I like about The West Wing but what I want to talk to you about today is something I noticed in the episodes and became very intrigued by.

The 5-Minute Meeting

Most of the meetings happened in short bursts. Some as short as 1-2 minutes and even in The Situation Room where serious things were going down, people got right to the point so they could fulfill the purpose of the meeting which was to make decisions. Information was given clearly and concisely and if more information was needed the meeting was ended and everyone moved on to do what they needed to do.

Otherwise, they made their decisions, everyone had their marching orders and they moved on. Meeting over. On to the next important issue.

I was reminded of this recently when I was meeting with a woman who was the head of an organization who was in a tight situation. She needed to have contact or facetime with many different groups but her days were getting eaten with meetings and she had to work longer hours to stay caught up on emails and get her own project work done.

I told her about what I’ve labelled “The 5-Minute Meeting” from The West Wing. She was intrigued and we explored what this could look like day-to-day for her.

Now this is not to say that all meetings are 5-minutes. That number is as arbitrary and meaningless as a 30, 60, or 90-minute meeting.

However, only allowing a meeting to as long as it needs to be prevents “needless expansion” from happening.

Why Meetings Go Too Long

“Needless expansion” includes, among other things, people starting to come late to meetings because the meeting never start on time anyway. Idle chit chat at the beginning of the meeting that serves no purpose other than put off actually starting the meeting, and people coming to the meeting unprepared because they know there is plenty of time to talk ideas through rather than flesh them out beforehand.

Also, included in this is when people feel the need to tell stories, gossip, or give irrelevant opinions to the matter at hand. Then there’s the time when two people have a conversation in the meeting that they could have by themselves after the meeting but choose to have everyone bear witness to it instead. I’ve been victim to this rude behavior and I’ve been the perpetrator as well.

There are so many ways a meeting can be hijacked by time wasters and if you’re a people pleaser you probably struggle with how to handle it. Rude behavior isn’t always conscious behavior and that’s why we need other people to kindly bring our attention to it.

Not all meetings are time wasters but it’s important to do something about the ones that are.

For meetings I know to be time wasters, I’m a big fan of cutting the time for the meeting in half. To make it work you need to let everyone know the timeframe in advance and set some ground rules.

The ground rules may include that the meeting will start promptly at the start time, all materials to be discussed need to submitted to all attendees, for example, 24-48 hours in advance of the meeting and everyone needs to be prepared to concisely give their report. Let everyone know how much time they will have to present and hold them to it. Time them if you have to. They’ll learn.

Don’t be Afraid to hold people accountable.

And how do you end a meeting that is starting to go overtime? If it’s in person you stand up and let everyone know that’s all the time you have. Give assignments, thank everyone for their time, and move toward the door. If it’s via video conference you call the meeting to a halt, give assignments, thank everyone for their time and end the call.

Soon enough people will come to realize that your time is valuable and when you say the meeting will be 18 minutes (or however long you set for it) that means it’s up to them to make sure they are prepared going into the meeting and get right to the point.

Even if it’s not your meeting you can make requests to have them run a bit differently or say you can only be there for part of the meeting.

If you’re someone who hates meetings because they eat up too much of your day start doing what you can to minimize your exposure to this time-waster.

Though it might be uncomfortable to do at first, the reward is that you will become more relaxed, more productive, and more effective. Isn’t that worth it?

Before we say goodbye, if you have not yet joined the Women Taking the Lead private facebook group, come join. Hang out with me and other amazing go-getting women who know the power of community and networking. Go to womentakingthelead.com/group and click on the green +Join Group button.

As always, I hope this was of value to you and here’s to your success!

Thank You to Our Sponsors!

Zebralove Web SolutionsYour website tells a story about your business! At Zebralove Web Solutions, Milly and her team are going to make sure your website tells the story you want your customers to hear. Connect with Milly at zebralovewebsolutions.com to create the impression you want to make!

Resources

Private Facebook CommunityChat, share and collaborate with other women listening to the podcast!

Accomplished: How to Go from Dreaming to DoingA simple, step by step system that gives you the foundation and structure to take your goals and make them happen.

The Accomplished Community: A community of entrepreneurial Type A women uniting to achieve their biggest goals with confidence, integrity and a sense of humor.

Subscribe to Women Taking the Lead

If you enjoyed this episode subscribe in iTunes, Stitcher RadioGoogle Play Music or iHeart Radio and never miss out on inspiration and community!

Oct 9, 2017

Maegan Watson is a personal stylist and founder at Watson Style Group, a firm dedicated to creating wardrobes that practically hand you your outfit every time you get dressed so you feel the way you want and love the way you look.  She has nearly a decade of experience supporting amazing women to feel great in their clothing so they’re empowered to stand out and speak up. She solves the unending question of “what should I wear today?” so your energy is reserved for family, fulfilling work, and fun! She lives in Chicago with her son, husband and chocolate lab.

Click to tweet.@mydearwatson86 is sharing her story to inspire you on Women Taking the Lead https://womentakingthelead.com/236 #inspiration

Playing Small Moment

Maegan offers complimentary styling sessions for new prospects. These 75-minute calls are super valuable and everyone really enjoys them. Wanting to increase the number of leads, Maegan started offering incentives for people to sign up for the calls. This actually had a negative affect on sales. People were signing up for the calls to receive the freebies, but not to work with Watson Styling Group. Maegan realized she was undervaluing herself, while also draining herself and the admin team.

Style of Leadership

Maegan’s leadership is constantly evolving. A key component to her leadership is giving credit to her team. When good things happen throughout the day, Maegan is mindful to take the time to send positive recognition to the team.

What Are You Excited About?

This past summer, Maegan and her team laughed a new membership subscription for her styling service. For a monthly fee, members are granted unlimited access to the talented team of stylists. Maegan is having a blast with this new project!

Current Business Challenge

As fun as the new membership group is, it also brings a lot of challenges as well. The ease to sign women up just isn’t there with the new structure, but the members who are there are extremely happy.

Leadership Practice

Taking 100% of the responsibility, 100% of the time is very important to Maegan. It allows the other person to have some space, but it allows the other person to take 100% responsibility as well. It’s ok if you need a day or two, but as long as you get there genuinely, its a fantastic, freeing practice.

Advice For Younger Self

Maegan would tell her undergrad self to stop being fueled by success and realize that it isn’t healthy. Maegan’s mom tells her students that the joy should be in the process of learning, and not in receiving an A.

Inspirational Quote

“We are not given dreams or ideas without the ability to create them. We are not given the vision of ourselves without the bravery to being this vision to life. All you have to do is tell yourself that you are worth it, over and over.”

Links

Website: http://watsonstylegroup.com
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/watsonstylegroup/

Thank You to Our Sponsors

 

Zebralove Web SolutionsYour website tells a story about your business! At Zebralove Web Solutions, Milly and her team are going to make sure your website tells the story you want your customers to hear. Connect with Milly at zebralovewebsolutions.com to create the impression you want to make!

Resources

Private Facebook CommunityChat, share and collaborate with other women in the community!

Accomplished: How to Go from Dreaming to DoingA simple, step by step system that gives you the foundation and structure to take your goals and make them happen.

The Accomplished Community: A community of entrepreneurial Type A women uniting to achieve their biggest goals with confidence, integrity and a sense of humor.

Subscribe to Women Taking the Lead

If you enjoyed this episode subscribe in iTunes, Stitcher RadioGoogle Play Music or iHeart Radio and never miss out on inspiration and community!

Oct 5, 2017

We have covered 3 of the 4 phases in the Cycle of Change using the card game analogy as first taught to me by iPEC Coaching. These are: The Toss In PhaseThe Shuffle Phase, and The Deal Phase. Now we’re going to cover The “Play the Game” Phase.

Phase 3: Play the Game (Action!)

“Play the Game” is an exciting and mostly positive time during the Cycle of Change when you are all in to live your dreams and reach new levels of success, fulfillment and well-being.

Whereas in previous stages you were either reflecting on the past or imagining the future, this phase is the time to be fully in the moment.

You are living the strategy and the plan you created in The Deal Phase.

It is a time of action but the amount of action you will take in this phase is based on your personality, how clear you are on your goal, how feasible your plan is and how much support you have.

That’s why The Deal Phase is so crucial to set you up for success in this phase, though most plans will work if you can only get out of your own way.

What that means is in the Play the Game Phase it’s important to manage your inner critic, which always comes to life when you are doing something new, big or scary. This is where self-doubt can start to plague you and if you allow it too much power you will unconsciously begin to self-sabotage.

Know that it is natural and normal for your inner critic to try to have a field day with you. Change the perspective that hearing your inner critic is a bad thing. Rather, hearing your inner critic means you are playing full out and that’s a great thing.

Manage Yourself to Remain Flexible

If you are able to manage your inner critic you will, for the most part, feel harmonious, optimistic, determined and fully alive.

If you are able to remain flexible you will be able to pivot and adjust if things don’t go according to plan. Let’s face it, things rarely go exactly according to plan so it’s important not to get too attached to the plan or judge yourself and others too harshly for not expecting the unexpected.

When I first planned to self-publish my book last year I was only going to release an eBook in Kindle. A few weeks before the publish date I interviewed Honoree Corder and in our post-interview chat she convinced me of the benefit of releasing a print version as well.

What I didn’t realize was how different it would be to format a book for print versus a book for Kindle, and that last-minute realization ate up more than half a day.

I was also launching a membership community with the release of my book. While the formatting mini-crisis was going on I also discovered the membership software was not playing nice with payment software.

To add to the madness, unbeknownst to me my web developer became horribly ill that week and so didn’t get my messages for a couple of days. All I knew was that I needed her and she had gone radio silent.

I had also failed to communicate to my Graphic Designer the exact date I intended to submit everything to Amazon and so mock ups and final approvals for the cover all happened within days.

Then there were videos, copy and worksheets that needed to be created and uploaded to the membership portion of my website.

However, in all of this, I was 100% in, feeling fully alive, and rolling with everything whether it was going according to plan or not.

Play the Long Game to Always Get Better

While this stage is usually associated with wins and success, it can also be the setting for disappointments, setbacks, and new challenges. You can probably look back on times in your life where the Play the Game Phase of the Cycle of Change did not go well.

If this is happening to you right now it’s important again not to judge yourself too harshly. Look on what is happening as a valuable lesson that you can examine and learn from so you go into the next Cycle of Change stronger and wiser.

Place your focus on what is working and what is not working without judgment and you’ll be able to make adjustments and pivot pretty easily because you won’t be heaping the past and emotion on the situation. Remain nimble and empowered by staying curious and looking for opportunities no matter what is happening. 

People typically love this phase the most out of all of the four phases and wish it would continue on like this indefinitely, or better yet, for the rest of their lives.

Although that sounds great, chances are if you are still open to growth and being your best self you will be back in the Toss In Phase and the cycle will begin once again. It doesn’t mean you’ve backtracked, it actually means you are moving forward, even though it may not feel like it at first.

If you’d like to connect with me and other women who are exploring these conversations head over to womentakingthelead.com/group to join the Women Taking the Lead private Facebook group. This is a great group to ask questions, get support and have some fun with other ambitious go-getting women.

As always, I hope this was helpful to you and here’s to your success.

Thank You to Our Sponsors!

Zebralove Web SolutionsYour website tells a story about your business! At Zebralove Web Solutions, Milly and her team are going to make sure your website tells the story you want your customers to hear. Connect with Milly at zebralovewebsolutions.com to create the impression you want to make!

Resources

Private Facebook CommunityChat, share and collaborate with other women listening to the podcast!

Accomplished: How to Go from Dreaming to DoingA simple, step by step system that gives you the foundation and structure to take your goals and make them happen.

The Accomplished Community: A community of entrepreneurial Type A women uniting to achieve their biggest goals with confidence, integrity and a sense of humor.

Subscribe to Women Taking the Lead

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Oct 2, 2017

Hira Ali is a Leadership Trainer, Speaker, Writer, ICF accredited Coach & Licensed NLP Practitioner. Over the past decade she has trained and coached hundreds of professionals belonging to various professions, cadres & ethnicities . Hira's articles have been have been featured in The ICF The Huffington Post, Thrive Global as well as Ellevate Network (a few of them have been shared by Arianna Huffington herself) She is regularly invited at various forums to talk on Leadership and Personal Development topics. Her self-development podcast 8 Minutes of Learning With Hira Ali has been featured in the Huff Post. Hira is the founder of ed Management Consulting, Advancing Your Potential & Revitalize and Rise.

Click to tweet: .@advancingyou is sharing her story to inspire you on Women Taking the Lead https://womentakingthelead.com/235 #inspiration

Playing Small Moment

While in school, Hira was terrified to speak in front of her peers, to the point of refusing to turn up to a speech she could be chosen at. Later, this caused her to cry as she was a good student with a lot to say. She now tries to push herself forward in those situations, but it still happens from time to time. Hira has to ask herself, “What is the worst that can happen?”

Style of Leadership

Hira’s leadership is always evolving. When she was managing a team in person, Hira took on more of a team leader role. Now that she is in the online world, her leadership has changed from people-oriented, to task-oriented. Hira is working on mixing the two.

What Are You Excited About?

Hira is working on her book and new online training program right now.

Current Business Challenge

Hira finds working remotely with teams can be challenging, especially when they are abroad. Hira tries to work one-on-one with her team and coordinate times that works for everyone.

Leadership Practice

Hira creates a good, but realistic, vision for her team in order to keep them motivated and driven.

Advice For Younger Self

Even up to a year ago, Hira would tell herself to be more focused and prioritize.

Inspirational Quote

“Whether you think you can, or you think you can’t, you’re right.” ~Henry Ford

Links

Website: www.advancingyourpotential.com
Website: www.revitalizeandrise.com
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/hira-ali-5972b91b
Twitter: https://twitter.com/advancingyou
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/advancingyour/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/advancingyourpotential/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/edmanagementconsulting/

Thank You to Our Sponsors

Zebralove Web SolutionsYour website tells a story about your business! At Zebralove Web Solutions, Milly and her team are going to make sure your website tells the story you want your customers to hear. Connect with Milly at zebralovewebsolutions.com to create the impression you want to make!

Resources

Private Facebook CommunityChat, share and collaborate with other women in the community!

Accomplished: How to Go from Dreaming to DoingA simple, step by step system that gives you the foundation and structure to take your goals and make them happen.

The Accomplished Community: A community of entrepreneurial Type A women uniting to achieve their biggest goals with confidence, integrity and a sense of humor.

Subscribe to Women Taking the Lead

If you enjoyed this episode subscribe in iTunes, Stitcher RadioGoogle Play Music or iHeart Radio and never miss out on inspiration and community!

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