3. Stop People-Pleasing: The Ultimate Guide for New Female Leaders
In the first episode of the podcast, I introduced the three dragons that women commonly encounter on their leadership adventure: overworking, perfectionism, and people-pleasing. Today, we’re taking a deeper look into challenge number two: people-pleasing, where it comes from, and how to slay this dragon.
If you tend to find yourself thinking you’re not enough, feeling pressure to be liked by others, overworking based on other people’s priorities, or struggling to set boundaries, be honest, and ask for help, then you are a people pleaser. You’re compromising yourself trying to keep everyone happy. However, your value is never determined by what other people think of you, and in this episode, I’m helping you see that for yourself.
Are you ready to stop putting everyone else first and start prioritizing yourself and your own needs? Most women wait until there is a significant impact on their wellbeing before they address their people-pleasing tendencies, but I’m showing you how to spot your people-pleasing early, before you hit burnout, so you can stop giving all your power away and start being the leader you know you can be.
To thank you for being a listener and supporter of The Confident Female Leader, I am sharing a free guided meditation with you! Download your meditation here.
What You’ll Learn From This Episode:
Why those of us socialized as women are wired to put everyone else before ourselves.
A scientific explanation of how your people-pleasing brain reacts to the idea of other people being unhappy.
How to identify where you’re people-pleasing in your professional and personal life.
Why people-pleasing is a particularly big problem when we get promoted to a leadership position.
Some common situations where your brain is going to want to people-please.
What a Power Audit is and how it will help you see where you’re giving your power away, and why.
How to prioritize the things that are most important to you so you can be honest and upfront about how you want to operate as a leader.
Listen to the Full Episode:
Featured on the Show:
To thank you for being a listener and supporter of The Confident Female Leader, I am sharing a free guided meditation with you! Download your meditation here.
Full Episode Transcript:
Leadership is an adventure. On this adventure women commonly face three struggles or dragons: overworking, perfectionism, and people pleasing. Today we take a deeper look into dragon number two, people pleasing, where it comes from and how to slay it.
Welcome to The Confident Female Leader podcast. A space for ambitious women stepping into leadership, who are ready to take control of their circumstances and own their magic. If you're ready to start shedding your self-doubt, come into your new identity as a leader, and stop consistently undervaluing yourself so you can feel more confident in your role, this show’s for you. I'm Annie Framand; Psychologist, Certified Feminist Coach and Master Trainer. And I'm on a mission to help women just like you stop overworking, overthinking, and overpleasing, so you can start creating success on your terms. Ready to create your dream life? Let's go.
Hola amigas, how are you? I am so good. I just got a kitty a couple of weeks ago. And now, I've become this crazy cat mom who constantly takes pictures and videos of her cat, and sends them to all of her friends. And yesterday, I saw a friend I hadn't seen in a couple of months. He doesn't speak any English, so when I see him, I get to actually observe how much my Spanish is progressing, which is so cool.
Anyway, what was the first thing I said to him, when I saw him yesterday? I was like, “Hey, how are you?” “I'm great. I got a cat. His name is Whiskey. He's three and a half months.” And then, I pulled out my phone to show him a pic. And he was like, “Okay…” So, if you have a pet, I'm sure you can relate, right?
Okay, let's dive into our episode, now. Today, we're going to be talking about dragon number two; people pleasing. As a reminder, if you think, “I'm not enough.” If you feel the pressure to be liked. If you tend to overwork on other people's priorities. If you don't set boundaries or ask for much help, then you're facing this dragon.
Basically, people pleasing is compromising yourself to please someone else. Not being honest with someone because you're afraid that it's going to negatively impact the relationship. You want everyone to be happy with you. And also, trying to keep everyone happy.
Now, as women, we're wired to put everyone else before ourselves. It starts when we're young, at home, at school, or in our communities. Now, of course, some women have not been socialized this way. But most of us have. We end up internalizing the patriarchy, and believing that valuing our own time and energy over what other people want is selfish.
When it comes to people pleasing, the societal belief that underpins this dragon is that your value is determined by what other people think of you, and other people's needs, and desires are always more important than your own. So, we fear being kicked out of the tribe, and that triggers a threat response in our brain.
Now, this threat response affects the amygdala, where our emotions are processed. And the frontal lobe, which is our brain’s CEO. Cortisol is released under threat, which results in decreased immunity, decreased decision making ability, less problem-solving skills, impaired learning, and lowered memory.
No wonder we keep trying to keep everyone happy, even when we know it's not good for us. Because we want to stay part of the tribe. And unfortunately, most women will wait until there's a significant impact on their well-being. Yeah right? You're like most of my clients, there's going to be an impact on your sleep. You might even be in pre-burnout or burnout before we actually start putting ourselves first.
Now, generally, men are socialized to believe that their needs, their desires, and even their whims, are legitimate. They need no justification. And they should be fulfilled by others around them, simply because these needs desires and whims exist.
So, if you notice yourself doing things like prioritizing communication from others; like email, like Slack texts, or whatever, over work that you, yourself, need to accomplish. If you feel yourself going along with strategies or ideas that you don't actually support, because someone else really wants you to do it that way. If you're spending uncompensated time helping or even doing other people's jobs for them, just because you were asked.
If you're having difficulty setting and holding boundaries around work at home, and around home at work. For example, you're responding to work communications when you're at home. Or, you're canceling vacations because everyone else is working hard.
If you're agreeing to quasi-social professional engagements or events that you don't want to attend. If you're joining unpaid committees at work you don't really want to be on, but you're saying yes just because you were asked. If you're having difficulty saying no to a request or pushing back on projects or timelines or priorities, because of the anxiety you experience; then, your people pleasing. Alright?
People pleasers have difficulty delegating, because we're motivated by the desire to be helpful and by a reluctance to burden other people, or let them down. I remember when I first was promoted into leadership. I ended up sometimes doing more of the work, because I didn't want to burden my employees.
And honestly, especially those who had young kids. I was like, “Well, I'm not going to ask her that, because, you know, she can't finish late, and she's got her kids.” And so, I ended up doing way too much work. You may be like that, too.
Often, when we're promoted, we used to be part of the team, and so we're leading people who used to be our colleagues. So, we have a hard time because we had a certain relationship with them, and now we become the boss. I'm like, “Well, I don't want to be asking them that. I don't want to burden them. I know their personal situations or their situations at large,” right?
While the need to please may serve you in the earlier stages of your career, it's going to impede you as you move higher, because it's going to erode your capacity to demonstrate leadership. And, it's going to serve as the ultimate tool for giving your power away.
So, we're going to be talking about how to not give your power away, today. Women are conditioned to believe that other people's opinions matter more than our own opinions of ourselves. And that our worth is based on a constantly shifting evaluation of who's happy with us, who likes us, who's upset with us, and who dislikes us.
That can be your bosses, your coworkers, your employees, or even that random dude at the cafe, right? So, you go to get your coffee in the morning, and you're like, “Oh, my God, this guy, he looks pissed off. What did I do wrong?” As women, we're socialized to believe that everything's social. And honestly, that kind of everything's about us. So, what other people think of us determines our value.
And we are constantly apologizing for no reason, right? We're thinking, “I said that. I did that. Maybe, I could have said it differently. I'm sorry. I didn't mean that,” even though we did. We go into this obsessive rumination of, “Oh, my God, I wonder if she's upset about what I said? Maybe, I could have said it this other way and she would have reacted better.” And, you know, it's like this constant film going in our head where we're judging ourselves.
Often, we're judging other people, too, right? We're evaluating ourselves. We're criticizing ourselves. And not in that ‘I want to get better’ objective way, but really, in a ‘I'm beating myself up’ way, and ‘constantly doubting myself’. Like, what could I have done differently? What should I have done differently? I'm a terrible person. I'm a terrible leader. Nobody likes me. And then, we go down those rabbit holes, and we don't even notice.
So, this week, I just want you to pause without doing anything. Take a moment to just notice if you start going down that rabbit hole. Like, just pause, and take a moment and reflect. You might want to just tell yourself, “Okay, going down a rabbit hole, don't need to do that.” Alright?
We also over invest in the status of our relationships. So, for example, if our boss likes us, then everything's going well. And if maybe we're not in the good graces of our boss or our colleague that day, that week, or ever, then something's gone terribly wrong, right?
We tend to overanalyze the facial expressions, the tones, and the nonverbals of other people. And I know, I tend to sometimes, still fall into that truck myself; not gonna lie. But at least I'm catching myself doing it, now. Because, you know, you get a lot of coaching, so it helps.
But when we become leaders, we tend to have a lot more information coming at us, right? So, a lot more emails, for example. Sometimes even texts, depending on how you're communicating with your people. What tends to happen, is that we're going to start to overanalyze the words, because we don't have a large percentage of the information.
So, 93% of our communications are nonverbal, and that's the case for everyone. Only 7% then, are words. You can start to see the problem with texts and emails. We're trying to fill in the gaps because our brains don't like ambiguity. We tend to fill in the blanks of what's missing, of the 93% that we're not getting, because all we have in an email, or a text are words.
So, if we don't have the tone, we're going to interpret the tone from what we're reading. Which is why, when you read a text or an email, you're like, “I wonder what they're thinking? I wonder if that's what they mean?” And then, we overanalyze and overinterpret, as women, right?
And we're going to judge our own professional abilities and success based on the perceptions of other people's reactions to our work. For example, one of my clients did a presentation and she thought it was okay. And then, when she left the meeting room, other people came up to her and said, “Wow, that presentation was so good. It was amazing. It was so clear.”
So, her perception of the presentation went up; she thought it was better just because of what other people thought of it. And I'm sure you can relate to that, too. Like, in a plane, as women, what tends to happen, is that we tend to put our children, our employees, or our spouses masks before putting out our own; that's our natural tendency.
But if you lack oxygen while you're putting their oxygen mask on, right before you manage to do it, you're gonna die and they're gonna die. So, you need to put your own oxygen mask on first. And then, you can help others. It's really the only way that you're going to be able to have enough energy and not burnout. So, you're going to want to determine who you help and in which circumstance. And, you're going to want to put your own oxygen mask on first.
The thing is, leadership is a marathon; it is not a 5K race. So, you're starting your leadership adventure; you're at the beginning of your race. And so, you're in it for the long haul. If you're burning out and you're giving all your energy in your first two kilometers, then unfortunately, you're not going to have enough energy for the rest of the race. It's really the same thing.
So, if you want, this week, a little experiment that I suggest, you're going to want to do a power audit. Just notice, who are you putting first? And, when? Is it your boss, your employees, your colleagues, your spouse, your friends, your parents, or kids? Where are you giving your power away? And ask yourself, why are you doing that?
What is the worst case? For example, if that person is unhappy with you, what's the worst thing that could happen? Right? Ultimately, if we put others first and do something we don't want, we end up being unhappy with ourselves. And so, we need to see that that matters more than what other people think of us.
It's like an office Christmas party. It's Christmas season right now when I'm recording this podcast. So, you take your time to go shopping for presents. You spend your money on nice, thoughtful gifts. And at the party, you start giving out your gifts, one after the other, to your employees, your boss, your colleagues.
Now, you're delighted when everyone tells you how beautiful your gifts are. And then, you realize there's no Christmas presents under the tree for you. Nobody thought to give you a present. So, you come back home disappointed, broke, and tired.
Ask yourself, how many Christmas presents did you give out this week? And, to who? Ask yourself also, in the last week, who did you say yes to, when you wanted to say no? And who did you help just because they asked? Leading you to finish your own work later.
I want you to practice putting your own oxygen mask on, first. Make sure there's enough Christmas presents for you under the tree, before you start giving yours away. This week, I want you to practice being available to your own tasks first, before assisting others. And, I want you to take a look at who can help you, too.
And as a bonus experiment, notice how many times a day you apologize. Saying things like, “I'm sorry. I didn't mean to. I just…” As women, we apologize a lot. I challenge you to go a day without apologizing. Now, that is a challenge. I did it myself, and I can tell you, even just in my emails, noticing the number of times that I said, “I just… I just want… I would just like… I'm just asking…” Okay? Without noticing it often, we're apologizing.
And one last thing, we can only control ourselves. We can’t control what other people think of us. And, that's something that I learned. I was in a job where I was doing everything I could to please one of my bosses. And honestly, I almost burnt myself out trying to do that. They had this never-ending list of what they wanted me to do, and how they wanted me to be, right? They had this manual, and in order to make them happy, I tried to do it all.
I wanted them to like me so much. No matter what I did, it was never enough. I was burning myself out trying to do it. So, I realized, “You know, this person is never going to be happy with me, no matter what I do or say.” Like, that was probably the best gift that they could give me; it's not liking me. Because I’m pretty good usually, at people liking me.
But because this person did not, I realized, “You know what? It's never gonna happen. So, I'm going to stop bending over backwards to make them happy.” And then, I realized, “Really, the only person that I need to please, is myself.” No matter what other people think of us, at the end of the day, we need to make sure that we're happy with ourself. That's the work, right? I mean, it's a journey.
And no matter what other people think of us, it really doesn't matter because we can't influence them. No matter what we say or do… Well, we can influence them, but we can't change them. Right? We can't control what other people think and feel about us.
What we want to do is get clear on our values and prioritize them accordingly. Like, what's really important here? For example, I remember at university, in order to get an A+, we had to work like, 30 hours more on a project than to get an A. And so, the difference between an A and an A+ was like, 30 hours of work. I mean, I don't know about you, but I wasn't willing to put in that 30 hours of work. So, I got an A, and I was perfectly okay with that.
But for some people, they will want to get that A+. And, they will want to work those 30 hours, right? But you need to look at; what are your values? Hey, if that's important to you, then do it. But make sure that it's important to you, and not to someone else. Alright? And so, if you're working those extra 30 hours to get something done perfectly, because it's someone else's expectations... We're gonna be talking about perfection next time because it's a moving target.
But if it's because your boss is asking you to do it a certain way. And then, what's happening, is you're spending your evenings at work instead of at home, and that's not something you want to do, then just get clear on that. And really focus on what matters to you. Is it pleasing your boss or is it getting home at night, to be home with your kids? Then, maybe have a good talk with your boss.
The thing is, as women, we struggle with having what we've been calling in the leadership realm, difficult conversations. I like to say, honest conversations. Because really, that's the point here, right? We're gonna look at an example with an employee. So, let's say someone's consistently delivering work with mistakes. Now, you know that you have to have a conversation with them. But you don't know how, and you're going to be afraid of their reaction.
You want to be honest, but you don't want to sound like a bitch. I'm probably going to dedicate a whole podcast episode on this, because so many of my clients struggle with this. And I did too when I became a leader. But for now, you can try a hack that works really well.
So, three steps: the first thing you want to do, is prepare. What is the one key message you want the employee to take away from the conversation? Maybe, that mistakes have gone up, and that needs to be addressed. Then, the second thing, is you're gonna want to start the conversation with, “Help me understand.” Because you really do want to understand where they're coming from, and they're going to lower their defenses if you truly listen.
So, for example, it could sound like, “I've noticed you're making lots of mistakes recently, compared to usual. Help me understand what's going on.” Alright? Keep your intro short and sweet. Maybe they're tired, for example. They're staying up late because they have a new baby.
And then, the third step, is once you've listened to them, you want to be empathetic and you want to be honest, and help them look for resolution, right? So, you're gonna say, for example, “I hear that you're tired, and that's leading you to make more mistakes. Considering that, how can you make sure you don't make as many mistakes moving forward?”
Now, you can brainstorm with them? Maybe, they can double check their work before it goes out, for example. And, you want to do the same thing if you're talking with your boss. If you feel that your boss is giving you work that is impacting your personal life, so you're working more hours based on the workload you're getting from your boss.
Then, you're gonna want to have an honest conversation with them, as well, about that, right? That it's impacting you, and that there's an impact on your personal life. You're gonna want to prepare, right? First step, what's the key message you want your boss to take away from the conversation? Then a second step, “Help me understand.”
For example, if you're the only one that this big project has been given to, so, “Help me understand how come I've been asked to do this.” And then, the third step would be, “Maybe, we could find someone to help me with this project. Because there's an impact on my personal life. And I'm finding that my workload is disproportionate when I compared to my colleagues,” for example.
And this is the thing, is that often, what we don't realize, is that our bosses do not have a line of sight on everyone's work, okay? So, they may not realize the amount of work that it's going to take you to go through a project. I've found this to be true. And when we step into leadership, we realize that, as well.
Alright, so if you've got a big span of control, if you've got a lot of employees that you're managing, you're going to realize that you have no idea, like, you can't account for all of the minutes, of all of the hours, of all of their days, right? Oftentimes, we're going to lose sight of that. So, it's up to us to bring that up to our bosses. If we feel that maybe, for example, our workload is not equitable compared to our colleagues.
On the next episode, we're going to be taking a deep dive into dragon number three; perfectionism. Alright, have a great week, everyone.
To celebrate the launch of the show, I'm going to be giving away a free five-minute meditation to everyone who subscribes, rates, and reviews the show, before December 31, 2022, to thank you for your feedback. This meditation will help you chill out, in real time, when your brain goes in overdrive.
I want your honest feedback on the podcast, so I can create an awesome show that resonates with you and provides tons of value. Visit annieframand.com/podcastlaunch to learn more about the giveaway and how to enter. And if you found this episode useful, I'd love for you to spread the word and share it with a woman you know who's also a new leader.
Thanks for listening to The Confident Female Leader podcast. Ready to dismantle the patriarchy with me? Come say hi at annieframand.com to learn more about how you can take this work deeper and apply what you're learning.
Welcome to The Confident Female Leader podcast. A space for ambitious women stepping into leadership, who are ready to take control of their circumstances and own their magic. If you're ready to start shedding your self-doubt, come into your new identity as a leader, and stop consistently undervaluing yourself so you can feel more confident in your role, this show’s for you. I'm Annie Framand; Psychologist, Certified Feminist Coach and Master Trainer. And I'm on a mission to help women just like you stop overworking, overthinking, and overpleasing, so you can start creating success on your terms. Ready to create your dream life? Let's go.
Hola amigas, how are you? I am so good. I just got a kitty a couple of weeks ago. And now, I've become this crazy cat mom who constantly takes pictures and videos of her cat, and sends them to all of her friends. And yesterday, I saw a friend I hadn't seen in a couple of months. He doesn't speak any English, so when I see him, I get to actually observe how much my Spanish is progressing, which is so cool.
Anyway, what was the first thing I said to him, when I saw him yesterday? I was like, “Hey, how are you?” “I'm great. I got a cat. His name is Whiskey. He's three and a half months.” And then, I pulled out my phone to show him a pic. And he was like, “Okay…” So, if you have a pet, I'm sure you can relate, right?
Okay, let's dive into our episode, now. Today, we're going to be talking about dragon number two; people pleasing. As a reminder, if you think, “I'm not enough.” If you feel the pressure to be liked. If you tend to overwork on other people's priorities. If you don't set boundaries or ask for much help, then you're facing this dragon.
Basically, people pleasing is compromising yourself to please someone else. Not being honest with someone because you're afraid that it's going to negatively impact the relationship. You want everyone to be happy with you. And also, trying to keep everyone happy.
Now, as women, we're wired to put everyone else before ourselves. It starts when we're young, at home, at school, or in our communities. Now, of course, some women have not been socialized this way. But most of us have. We end up internalizing the patriarchy, and believing that valuing our own time and energy over what other people want is selfish.
When it comes to people pleasing, the societal belief that underpins this dragon is that your value is determined by what other people think of you, and other people's needs, and desires are always more important than your own. So, we fear being kicked out of the tribe, and that triggers a threat response in our brain.
Now, this threat response affects the amygdala, where our emotions are processed. And the frontal lobe, which is our brain’s CEO. Cortisol is released under threat, which results in decreased immunity, decreased decision making ability, less problem-solving skills, impaired learning, and lowered memory.
No wonder we keep trying to keep everyone happy, even when we know it's not good for us. Because we want to stay part of the tribe. And unfortunately, most women will wait until there's a significant impact on their well-being. Yeah right? You're like most of my clients, there's going to be an impact on your sleep. You might even be in pre-burnout or burnout before we actually start putting ourselves first.
Now, generally, men are socialized to believe that their needs, their desires, and even their whims, are legitimate. They need no justification. And they should be fulfilled by others around them, simply because these needs desires and whims exist.
So, if you notice yourself doing things like prioritizing communication from others; like email, like Slack texts, or whatever, over work that you, yourself, need to accomplish. If you feel yourself going along with strategies or ideas that you don't actually support, because someone else really wants you to do it that way. If you're spending uncompensated time helping or even doing other people's jobs for them, just because you were asked.
If you're having difficulty setting and holding boundaries around work at home, and around home at work. For example, you're responding to work communications when you're at home. Or, you're canceling vacations because everyone else is working hard.
If you're agreeing to quasi-social professional engagements or events that you don't want to attend. If you're joining unpaid committees at work you don't really want to be on, but you're saying yes just because you were asked. If you're having difficulty saying no to a request or pushing back on projects or timelines or priorities, because of the anxiety you experience; then, your people pleasing. Alright?
People pleasers have difficulty delegating, because we're motivated by the desire to be helpful and by a reluctance to burden other people, or let them down. I remember when I first was promoted into leadership. I ended up sometimes doing more of the work, because I didn't want to burden my employees.
And honestly, especially those who had young kids. I was like, “Well, I'm not going to ask her that, because, you know, she can't finish late, and she's got her kids.” And so, I ended up doing way too much work. You may be like that, too.
Often, when we're promoted, we used to be part of the team, and so we're leading people who used to be our colleagues. So, we have a hard time because we had a certain relationship with them, and now we become the boss. I'm like, “Well, I don't want to be asking them that. I don't want to burden them. I know their personal situations or their situations at large,” right?
While the need to please may serve you in the earlier stages of your career, it's going to impede you as you move higher, because it's going to erode your capacity to demonstrate leadership. And, it's going to serve as the ultimate tool for giving your power away.
So, we're going to be talking about how to not give your power away, today. Women are conditioned to believe that other people's opinions matter more than our own opinions of ourselves. And that our worth is based on a constantly shifting evaluation of who's happy with us, who likes us, who's upset with us, and who dislikes us.
That can be your bosses, your coworkers, your employees, or even that random dude at the cafe, right? So, you go to get your coffee in the morning, and you're like, “Oh, my God, this guy, he looks pissed off. What did I do wrong?” As women, we're socialized to believe that everything's social. And honestly, that kind of everything's about us. So, what other people think of us determines our value.
And we are constantly apologizing for no reason, right? We're thinking, “I said that. I did that. Maybe, I could have said it differently. I'm sorry. I didn't mean that,” even though we did. We go into this obsessive rumination of, “Oh, my God, I wonder if she's upset about what I said? Maybe, I could have said it this other way and she would have reacted better.” And, you know, it's like this constant film going in our head where we're judging ourselves.
Often, we're judging other people, too, right? We're evaluating ourselves. We're criticizing ourselves. And not in that ‘I want to get better’ objective way, but really, in a ‘I'm beating myself up’ way, and ‘constantly doubting myself’. Like, what could I have done differently? What should I have done differently? I'm a terrible person. I'm a terrible leader. Nobody likes me. And then, we go down those rabbit holes, and we don't even notice.
So, this week, I just want you to pause without doing anything. Take a moment to just notice if you start going down that rabbit hole. Like, just pause, and take a moment and reflect. You might want to just tell yourself, “Okay, going down a rabbit hole, don't need to do that.” Alright?
We also over invest in the status of our relationships. So, for example, if our boss likes us, then everything's going well. And if maybe we're not in the good graces of our boss or our colleague that day, that week, or ever, then something's gone terribly wrong, right?
We tend to overanalyze the facial expressions, the tones, and the nonverbals of other people. And I know, I tend to sometimes, still fall into that truck myself; not gonna lie. But at least I'm catching myself doing it, now. Because, you know, you get a lot of coaching, so it helps.
But when we become leaders, we tend to have a lot more information coming at us, right? So, a lot more emails, for example. Sometimes even texts, depending on how you're communicating with your people. What tends to happen, is that we're going to start to overanalyze the words, because we don't have a large percentage of the information.
So, 93% of our communications are nonverbal, and that's the case for everyone. Only 7% then, are words. You can start to see the problem with texts and emails. We're trying to fill in the gaps because our brains don't like ambiguity. We tend to fill in the blanks of what's missing, of the 93% that we're not getting, because all we have in an email, or a text are words.
So, if we don't have the tone, we're going to interpret the tone from what we're reading. Which is why, when you read a text or an email, you're like, “I wonder what they're thinking? I wonder if that's what they mean?” And then, we overanalyze and overinterpret, as women, right?
And we're going to judge our own professional abilities and success based on the perceptions of other people's reactions to our work. For example, one of my clients did a presentation and she thought it was okay. And then, when she left the meeting room, other people came up to her and said, “Wow, that presentation was so good. It was amazing. It was so clear.”
So, her perception of the presentation went up; she thought it was better just because of what other people thought of it. And I'm sure you can relate to that, too. Like, in a plane, as women, what tends to happen, is that we tend to put our children, our employees, or our spouses masks before putting out our own; that's our natural tendency.
But if you lack oxygen while you're putting their oxygen mask on, right before you manage to do it, you're gonna die and they're gonna die. So, you need to put your own oxygen mask on first. And then, you can help others. It's really the only way that you're going to be able to have enough energy and not burnout. So, you're going to want to determine who you help and in which circumstance. And, you're going to want to put your own oxygen mask on first.
The thing is, leadership is a marathon; it is not a 5K race. So, you're starting your leadership adventure; you're at the beginning of your race. And so, you're in it for the long haul. If you're burning out and you're giving all your energy in your first two kilometers, then unfortunately, you're not going to have enough energy for the rest of the race. It's really the same thing.
So, if you want, this week, a little experiment that I suggest, you're going to want to do a power audit. Just notice, who are you putting first? And, when? Is it your boss, your employees, your colleagues, your spouse, your friends, your parents, or kids? Where are you giving your power away? And ask yourself, why are you doing that?
What is the worst case? For example, if that person is unhappy with you, what's the worst thing that could happen? Right? Ultimately, if we put others first and do something we don't want, we end up being unhappy with ourselves. And so, we need to see that that matters more than what other people think of us.
It's like an office Christmas party. It's Christmas season right now when I'm recording this podcast. So, you take your time to go shopping for presents. You spend your money on nice, thoughtful gifts. And at the party, you start giving out your gifts, one after the other, to your employees, your boss, your colleagues.
Now, you're delighted when everyone tells you how beautiful your gifts are. And then, you realize there's no Christmas presents under the tree for you. Nobody thought to give you a present. So, you come back home disappointed, broke, and tired.
Ask yourself, how many Christmas presents did you give out this week? And, to who? Ask yourself also, in the last week, who did you say yes to, when you wanted to say no? And who did you help just because they asked? Leading you to finish your own work later.
I want you to practice putting your own oxygen mask on, first. Make sure there's enough Christmas presents for you under the tree, before you start giving yours away. This week, I want you to practice being available to your own tasks first, before assisting others. And, I want you to take a look at who can help you, too.
And as a bonus experiment, notice how many times a day you apologize. Saying things like, “I'm sorry. I didn't mean to. I just…” As women, we apologize a lot. I challenge you to go a day without apologizing. Now, that is a challenge. I did it myself, and I can tell you, even just in my emails, noticing the number of times that I said, “I just… I just want… I would just like… I'm just asking…” Okay? Without noticing it often, we're apologizing.
And one last thing, we can only control ourselves. We can’t control what other people think of us. And, that's something that I learned. I was in a job where I was doing everything I could to please one of my bosses. And honestly, I almost burnt myself out trying to do that. They had this never-ending list of what they wanted me to do, and how they wanted me to be, right? They had this manual, and in order to make them happy, I tried to do it all.
I wanted them to like me so much. No matter what I did, it was never enough. I was burning myself out trying to do it. So, I realized, “You know, this person is never going to be happy with me, no matter what I do or say.” Like, that was probably the best gift that they could give me; it's not liking me. Because I’m pretty good usually, at people liking me.
But because this person did not, I realized, “You know what? It's never gonna happen. So, I'm going to stop bending over backwards to make them happy.” And then, I realized, “Really, the only person that I need to please, is myself.” No matter what other people think of us, at the end of the day, we need to make sure that we're happy with ourself. That's the work, right? I mean, it's a journey.
And no matter what other people think of us, it really doesn't matter because we can't influence them. No matter what we say or do… Well, we can influence them, but we can't change them. Right? We can't control what other people think and feel about us.
What we want to do is get clear on our values and prioritize them accordingly. Like, what's really important here? For example, I remember at university, in order to get an A+, we had to work like, 30 hours more on a project than to get an A. And so, the difference between an A and an A+ was like, 30 hours of work. I mean, I don't know about you, but I wasn't willing to put in that 30 hours of work. So, I got an A, and I was perfectly okay with that.
But for some people, they will want to get that A+. And, they will want to work those 30 hours, right? But you need to look at; what are your values? Hey, if that's important to you, then do it. But make sure that it's important to you, and not to someone else. Alright? And so, if you're working those extra 30 hours to get something done perfectly, because it's someone else's expectations... We're gonna be talking about perfection next time because it's a moving target.
But if it's because your boss is asking you to do it a certain way. And then, what's happening, is you're spending your evenings at work instead of at home, and that's not something you want to do, then just get clear on that. And really focus on what matters to you. Is it pleasing your boss or is it getting home at night, to be home with your kids? Then, maybe have a good talk with your boss.
The thing is, as women, we struggle with having what we've been calling in the leadership realm, difficult conversations. I like to say, honest conversations. Because really, that's the point here, right? We're gonna look at an example with an employee. So, let's say someone's consistently delivering work with mistakes. Now, you know that you have to have a conversation with them. But you don't know how, and you're going to be afraid of their reaction.
You want to be honest, but you don't want to sound like a bitch. I'm probably going to dedicate a whole podcast episode on this, because so many of my clients struggle with this. And I did too when I became a leader. But for now, you can try a hack that works really well.
So, three steps: the first thing you want to do, is prepare. What is the one key message you want the employee to take away from the conversation? Maybe, that mistakes have gone up, and that needs to be addressed. Then, the second thing, is you're gonna want to start the conversation with, “Help me understand.” Because you really do want to understand where they're coming from, and they're going to lower their defenses if you truly listen.
So, for example, it could sound like, “I've noticed you're making lots of mistakes recently, compared to usual. Help me understand what's going on.” Alright? Keep your intro short and sweet. Maybe they're tired, for example. They're staying up late because they have a new baby.
And then, the third step, is once you've listened to them, you want to be empathetic and you want to be honest, and help them look for resolution, right? So, you're gonna say, for example, “I hear that you're tired, and that's leading you to make more mistakes. Considering that, how can you make sure you don't make as many mistakes moving forward?”
Now, you can brainstorm with them? Maybe, they can double check their work before it goes out, for example. And, you want to do the same thing if you're talking with your boss. If you feel that your boss is giving you work that is impacting your personal life, so you're working more hours based on the workload you're getting from your boss.
Then, you're gonna want to have an honest conversation with them, as well, about that, right? That it's impacting you, and that there's an impact on your personal life. You're gonna want to prepare, right? First step, what's the key message you want your boss to take away from the conversation? Then a second step, “Help me understand.”
For example, if you're the only one that this big project has been given to, so, “Help me understand how come I've been asked to do this.” And then, the third step would be, “Maybe, we could find someone to help me with this project. Because there's an impact on my personal life. And I'm finding that my workload is disproportionate when I compared to my colleagues,” for example.
And this is the thing, is that often, what we don't realize, is that our bosses do not have a line of sight on everyone's work, okay? So, they may not realize the amount of work that it's going to take you to go through a project. I've found this to be true. And when we step into leadership, we realize that, as well.
Alright, so if you've got a big span of control, if you've got a lot of employees that you're managing, you're going to realize that you have no idea, like, you can't account for all of the minutes, of all of the hours, of all of their days, right? Oftentimes, we're going to lose sight of that. So, it's up to us to bring that up to our bosses. If we feel that maybe, for example, our workload is not equitable compared to our colleagues.
On the next episode, we're going to be taking a deep dive into dragon number three; perfectionism. Alright, have a great week, everyone.
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