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Gretchen Schott (00:02)
We have to know ourselves before we can know others. We have to lead ourselves before we can lead others,

Jill Lehman (00:06)
Really knowing your values and what you stand for, what you want to be a part of, how you show up or want to show up, I think are all really critical.

Sarah Turner (00:15)
What you do matters more than you think. It could set somebody else in motion to create habits and we do, we mirror each other.

JoDee Curtis (00:27)
Welcome to The JoyPowered® Workspace Podcast, where we help HR and business leaders embrace joy in the workplace. I’m JoDee Curtis, owner of Purple Ink, an HR consulting and talent development firm. And with me is my friend and co-host, Susan White, owner Susan Tinder White Consulting, an HR consulting practice. Susan is also an executive collaborator with us at Purple Ink.

This year in 2025, I asked five other female leaders, professionals, and thought leaders to co-author a book with me called Joy@Work: When Women Lead. This book was written from the perspective of women, but not just for women. It’s for those who work with women, for women, lead women, or just know women.

A recurring theme throughout this book is the concept of a you-powered perspective. That is, claiming your own agency and giving yourself permission to create joy on your terms. Another author highlights the powerful triad of challenge, control, and commitment. These elements rooted in the psychology of resilience are shown to increase well-being and yes, even joy in the workplace. Another contributor reminds us that joy is a choice. It doesn’t always come naturally, especially during difficult seasons or in unsupportive environments. But choosing joy is not about ignoring what’s hard. It’s about deciding what matters.

So if you’ve ever questioned whether joy belongs in the workplace, this book is your answer. Last month we heard from three of the authors about their thoughts on finding joy at work, and today we’ll have three more.

Gretchen Schott is a chief learning officer, keynote speaker, podcast host, certified facilitator, and the owner of Leading Well, a coaching practice.

Susan White (02:47)
Hello Gretchen, we are so glad that you’re here.

Gretchen Schott (02:49)
Thank you, Susan, JoDee, I’m grateful for the opportunity. Thanks for having me.

Susan White (02:53)
So your chapter is entitled “Choose to Lead with Love.” What does that mean in the context of leadership today?

Gretchen Schott (03:02)
When we are leading well and choosing to lead with love, we are leading as our best selves. We are focused on how humble we are. We have proper motivation and we’re confident in what we’re doing. And I think if we are thinking about leadership and as a person that might be managing other people, we have responsibility to be intentional and thoughtful and take that responsibility seriously. And if we’re not managing people, I believe you can be a leader even when you’re not managing people, just as good humans, we have to show up as our best self. And we do that through an understanding of our humility and our motivation and our confidence.

JoDee Curtis (03:48)
And Gretchen, you open your chapter talking about a personal tragedy. How did that experience or shape your views on joy and leadership?

Gretchen Schott (04:01)
Yeah, the beginning of this year was a really rough one for my family. We had a surprising death in my family. I won’t give away too many things. But in that moment of probably the deepest grief and suffering that I’ve ever experienced in my life at this point, I just recognized that there was purpose for that suffering. And…

And that purpose for me was to grow closer in my faith and to be the woman of faith that I am. But more importantly, I think it provided context for me to really make the choice to move through that suffering, not get over it, but have there be purpose behind it. Because when I didn’t understand the purpose, it was just torment. And I write about this in the book, I say that, you know, torment is suffering without purpose. And it’s where we’re feeling helpless and there’s no meaning and we’re like stuck. And I’m not a person that likes to go slow at any point in my life. I like to move things fast, but suffering is something that doesn’t always, and especially grief doesn’t happen on our time.

So for me, It was really a way to kind of get crystallized and clarify as to who I am, who I want to be in the world, and how I could use this experience that was extremely humbling and do something good with it and some purpose. I honestly, I mean, it’s when the book comes out, it’ll be six months. And I still kind of wrestle.

Things come up that completely surprise me and take my breath away that I wasn’t prepared for. But I’m grateful that I recognize that you cultivate your own joy and that I use those gifts that I have of leadership to really help me kind of get through those times.

Susan White (06:03)
Wow, I am so sorry that you’ve been on this journey and thank you so much for using it to inspire the rest of us, honestly. So for those listening who feel called to lead with more love, what are some first steps or easy steps or low hanging fruit that they could take this week?

Gretchen Schott (06:31)
Yeah, I would say we can’t lead well, we can’t lead with love if we don’t first love ourselves. Right? And so if you are managing people and you want to be a manager or a leader that leads with love, the first thing you have to check yourself, I think, is like, how well am I loving myself? Because if we’re not loving ourselves well, then it’s not going to work. Because we put off loving, it’s going to come back and get us. Right?

So my first, you know, quick low hanging fruit things would be, do an assessment, check yourself, like how well are you loving yourself? And what do you do to love yourself well? Maybe it’s exercising, maybe it’s having quiet time, maybe it’s reading scripture, maybe it’s spending time with friends, maybe it’s creating that to-do list and feeling so good when you get to cross those things off your list, right? So like whatever allows you to feel loving towards yourself, you have to do that first.

And then the second thing that I would, as a manager, I would say, really understanding motivation. Understanding what motivates you does not necessarily motivate the people you’re working with, right? I look at motivation as like possessing the desire to be successful with and for the benefit of others. And so low-hanging fruit or actionable things you could do would be, how are you motivating your people and how are you understanding what motivates the people that work with you?

And are you providing even just like an expansion of scope and responsibility to allow somebody to kind of like move into that joy that they have in the work that they do. Those would be just a couple quick little things that I would say could do right off the bat to lead more with love.

Susan White (08:18)
I think that’s wonderful.

JoDee Curtis (08:18)
Yeah. Yeah. Great advice. And it’s not easy, right? Because people are motivated by different things, which means we have to lead them differently. And we can’t just take a one size fits all approach to do it.

Gretchen Schott (08:29)
Right. Well, and I think there’s a lot of managers that make the mistake of making an assumption or they have bias, right? They make the assumption that they know, right? Like, I’m a working mom, so of course I’m going to know what’s going to motivate another working mom, right? And we really need to know our people, right? We really have to know them. And we can’t know them if we don’t ask questions, if we’re not curious, if we’re not interested and we’re not listening.

And sometimes, you know, listening, we have to also pay attention to what’s happening in between the words, what they’re not saying, right? And all those types of things. Too often, I think managers make a lot of assumption of like, I know, like, I’ve got kids, right? Or, yeah, I know what it’s like. I’ve done this before. And we kind of stop asking the question to being curious.

JoDee Curtis (09:26)
Right, right, yeah. You mentioned the difference between content and contentment. Can you unpack how that insight influenced your work?

Gretchen Schott (09:33)
Oh my gosh. Yes. I get up in the morning and I do like a devotional. I don’t know if you guys ladies all do the same thing too. But I was sitting there and I was like listening to this devotional and she said something about, you know, feeling content. And I was like, content, content. And then I was like, content. Is that the same word? I think it’s the same. And I literally like asked Siri, I was like, how do you spell content? How do you spell content? Because I thought that I was like, they are the same word. My gosh. Right?

So for me, that was like a huge light bulb because I create so much content as you guys, I’m sure you ladies, you know this too. And it really made me like pause. It disrupted my thoughts. And I was like, is the content that I’m creating bringing contentment? Is it bringing joy? Am I, am I receiving joy from creating all this content, right?

And it’s like when this whole thing, and I feel like as I’m talking about this, I was like, how many times can I say the word content? My husband was like, yeah, I get this was like a big prayer moment for you this morning, but go have another cup of coffee. I’m sure about this, I don’t wanna talk about it anymore. Cause I was like content, content, contentment, content, oh my gosh. So yeah, that’s what it meant for me.

Susan White (10:55)
So as you know, we ask a JoyPowered® question. So our question for you, Gretchen, is you say that joy isn’t something to be found, it’s something to be created. How can leaders practically create joy at work?

Gretchen Schott (11:09)
There’s so many ways. Oh my gosh, there’s so many ways. Again, I’m going to go back to we have to know ourselves before we can know others. We have to lead ourselves before we can lead others, right? And so if you are not joyful when you’re at work, you cannot think that your employees are and it’s just you, right? Like start with you. You should be concerned if you don’t feel joy, but yet you are expecting everyone else at work to feel joyful. Right.

The second thing I would say is, how you are choosing to motivate your people, how are you choosing to increase the confidence in the people that you work with, how are you increasing their humility or providing space for them to be humble and safe. Those are ways in which I think that you could start creating joy in your workplace, little things that you as a leader can personally take responsibility for and that you can actually impact and have control over.

Susan White (12:13)
Terrific.

JoDee Curtis (12:14)
Nice, I like that. And Gretchen, how can our listeners reach out to you if they have questions on this topic or on your chapter or just interested in learning more about what you do?

Gretchen Schott (12:29)
Thank you. That’s so generous. I appreciate you asking. I’m on LinkedIn, so you can find me on LinkedIn or you can go to my website. It’s really easy. It’s GretchenSchott.com. And you can find me there and I’d love to hear from you. You can tell it my contact page or message me on LinkedIn and I’d love to have a conversation.

Susan White (12:49)
And Gretchen, tell us your podcast. Tell our listeners because obviously the people listening to us like podcasts.

Gretchen Schott (12:53)
Yes, my podcast is called Made for Impact. And on that show, I talk with leaders about the impact that they are making in the world or that they hope to make in the world. So if you go to my website, there’s a link to the show there too.

JoDee Curtis (13:09)
And we’ll put all that in our show notes too.

Gretchen Schott (13:13)
Thank you, that’s generous.

JoDee Curtis (13:15)
Our next author is Jill Lehman. Jill is a certified professional coach, fractional HR leader, owner of an art gallery, and an author and speaker.

Susan White (13:28)
Jill, thank you so much for coming back on the podcast. We are so glad that you’re here today.

Jill Lehman (13:33)
I’m excited to talk to you all again today too. It’s been a while.

Susan White (13:36)
right. So Jill, you talk about the concept of being you-powered. What was the turning point in your career that inspired this type of philosophy?

Jill Lehman (13:46)
It’s a great question and I remember the day vividly even though was a decade or more ago. I was an HR manager in an organization and the existing HR director had resigned and didn’t think that I had enough experience to take the role. So I knew then and there I needed to advocate for myself. So I made the decision to go and talk to the plant manager at the time who was the hiring manager and asked for the role and it worked. So I think I learned from that experience that you really needed to advocate for yourself if you wanted to have the opportunities that you desired your career.

Susan White (14:29)
Well done, well done.

JoDee Curtis (14:29)
Yeah. Yes. Well done. And so true. Right. So many things I think happen to people and you know, we, we ask, did you ask? Did you tell them? And people say, no, I wanted them to notice me. And sometimes…

Susan White (14:48)
Or they should have known. Yeah.

JoDee Curtis (14:48)
Right. Yeah. Yeah.

Jill Lehman (14:48)
That’s what we all want, but it’s not always reality, right?

Susan White (14:53)
Mm-hmm.

JoDee Curtis (14:53)
Right, right. Well, and Jill, in the book, in your chapter, you give an example of a woman named Robin, who I think is a powerful example of someone on career autopilot. What are some early signs that someone might be drifting rather than driving their career?

Jill Lehman (15:17)
There’s a couple signs that I think really hit that red flag or even yellow flags for individuals. It’s one you feel stalled. You’re not where you want to be in your career. You’re not always sure why, but you just feel stuck. Maybe you’re feeling disengaged and… because you’re just not excited maybe about the opportunity that you’re in or you feel you’ve outgrown that opportunity or even experiencing burnout because all those things are hitting you.

Susan White (15:48)
You emphasize a self-awareness as a foundational gear. What are some practical ways people can begin building that self-awareness today?

Jill Lehman (15:57)
Probably one of my favorite questions and where we as coaches spend a lot of time is on the self-awareness component. And it is a foundational gear from that perspective. And it starts, I think, with reflection and a good activity is to start journaling and really start document what you’re feeling and what you’re experiencing. Not necessarily why at that point, but just what you’re feeling and experiencing.

And then start looking for the themes that start to develop from that. Another area to really gain some self-awareness is ask for feedback. But when you ask for feedback, you have to be open to it because you might hear some really great pearls of wisdom of what you do really well, where you might have opportunities that exist for you to get where you need to go.

Some other things around self-awareness, to spend some time to really understand what your values are. Because it’s going to be critical for you to understand where you’re going to be the best fit, what you want to focus on, maybe where your boundaries are, and we can talk about those kind of things later. But really knowing your values and what you stand for, what you want to be a part of, how you show up or want to show up, I think are all really critical.

Some other things. It’s just like in business, we do these things called SWOT analysis, strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, threats in our businesses. We need to do that for ourselves as an individual in the career and the life goals that we have. what are those key skills or strengths that we have that exist in us? And then where do we have opportunities for growth and improvement? And being really honest in what those may be, feeling good about what our strengths are but being aware of where we have gaps or opportunities.

The last is there’s all kinds of tools and we can’t get too wrapped up in all the tools that exist around self-awareness, but you can do strength finders to understand your strengths. You can do DiSC profiles or insight profiles or Enneagrams to find out your personality types. And there’s a laundry list of others. I’m just naming a few, but there’s some good tools out there that you can work with a coach or a mentor to find and explore. Those are really, I think, some of the key areas around self-awareness that you can help create for yourself.

JoDee Curtis (18:34)
Jill, you mentioned the importance of setting boundaries, which I think is so important for all of us to do. How can someone start doing that in a workplace that doesn’t always respect boundaries?

Jill Lehman (18:49)
None of us have experienced those workplaces, have we? It’s common. Because one of the key things is the employer, the manager doesn’t know what your limits are. And so we have to know what our limits are. So what are those things that are just non-negotiable for us? And what are the things that we need to think through our of we can accept or not accept. I think we also, when we learn and discover what those limits are, we should put them through, if you’re in HR, you’ve heard of the reasonable person test. So are those boundaries or limits that I’m putting in place, are they something that would generally be a reasonable situation to request or ask for based on the circumstance or the situation or where my values are?

When we know our limits, we get good at communicating. Another thing is oftentimes our leaders come to us saying they need something, right? We get this, I need this. I need you to deliver this to me or put this together for me. What we don’t do is we don’t ask clarifying questions. We don’t ask, well, when do you need this by? Where is this in the priority list? If it’s a high priority, which priorities or other tasks that I’m currently working on can we pause? So we need to get really good at communicating around what are the expectations regarding this project or this assignment or this need to make sure that you and I understand what’s being asked for and we put realistic expectations around it.

The other thing is we have to be consistent in what we ask for. So if one day we say, we’ll do this and we move past our boundary, we give permission that our boundaries are flexible. So we need to be really careful and mindful. We just don’t say no to everything, right? But we do need to have consistency. If it’s a non-negotiable, then we need to figure out how respectfully, professionally, we set that boundary and we don’t kind of hem-haw around it, if that makes sense. If it’s a reasonable person boundary.

JoDee Curtis (21:18)
Yeah. Yeah.

Susan White (21:21)
I think that’s very fair. And I do believe that being an advocate of yourself, it can be intimidating. I think that for me, it probably took me decades to be good at it and decide what I’m willing to do and not do. But you do kind of have to be willing to walk. If it’s non-negotiable, if it’s something really important to you, you’ve got to have that confidence. Any advice on maybe building that confidence or anything someone can do advocating for themself, if this is not natural for them or if it’s uncomfortable?

Jill Lehman (21:51)
Yeah, because self-advocacy sounds really powerful, but it’s really scary and filled with all kinds of anxieties and imposter syndromes and you name the words that come up with that. I think that’s why I have leaned into and really enjoy energy coaching, because I believe that… one of the things I tell clients as we talk about energy is lean into your higher energy levels.

When we talk about higher energy levels, it’s not just our physical energy or our emotional energy. It’s the lens in which we look at life. And if we look at it as victims of circumstances or with our ego, or if we look at it for opportunity and win-win situations and solutions. So I think leaning into those higher energy levels.

Practice to make sure that you can really articulate the things that we’ve talked about. You’ve spent some time to understand yourself, to prepare for the conversations, so you can think of the best way to deliver it, what energy level you want to deliver it in. again, I think win-win solutions for the organization and for the individual are always the things you want to try to put in place.

And when you look for win-wins, chances are you won’t go wrong because you’ve got the best interest of all parties involved. It’s not just about you. It’s not just about them. It’s about how do we create a win-win to get what everyone needs in this scenario. When we think about that, maybe it takes a little bit of the scary out of it.

Susan White (23:36)
That’s great.

JoDee Curtis (23:36)
Like it. Like it. So Jill, our joy question for you today, if a listener is feeling stuck in a safe job, but dreams of becoming something more fulfilling, what’s the first step you’d recommend they take toward becoming you-powered or JoyPowered®?

Jill Lehman (23:57)
I’m gonna repeat some of the things that we’ve already talked about. Journaling. Really, I think a free tool that we all have is start to really jot down those experiences and things that you’re feeling, the things that you want, the things that might be missing. Journaling is gonna help you gain clarity and it’s gonna force you to spend some time with yourself.

We’ve already talked about lean into your higher energy levels. It’s really easy for us to let our egos take over and to feel like victims or feel defeated when we all have the opportunity again, free of charge for us to look for how do we create a win-win solution in this? How do I put forth the conversation that isn’t going to shut the other person down or shut me down?

But lean into it to feel confident and comfortable. And just explore the work that you enjoy doing. Chances are that’ll fill the paper for you and get you started. Forget about money and title. Usually that don’t bring us the joy and happiness for the long term. Really think about the work that you enjoy.

doing, the way you want to spend your time, where you feel you can bring the greatest value, and those are the things that lead to joy.

JoDee Curtis (25:30)
That’s right.

Susan White (25:30)
Great. So how can listeners reach out to you if they want to learn more about this topic?

Jill Lehman (25:39)
The best way is you could always email me at super easy email address, jill at evolve HR dot com. You can find me on LinkedIn or you can go right to our website and schedule an online meeting with me, make it super simple for you. So jill at evolve group dot com, LinkedIn, my website.

Susan White (25:59)
Thank you.

JoDee Curtis (26:00)
Sounds great. Thanks for joining us.

Susan White (26:02)
Jill, thank you so much.

Jill Lehman (26:04)
Thanks for having me and I’m so excited for the book to launch and everyone to hear from this great group of women leaders.

JoDee Curtis (26:13)
Our third guest today is Sarah Turner. Sarah is an executive coach and keynote speakers and offers customized leadership training through her company, Lumino Leadership.

Thank you so much for joining us today.

Sarah Turner (26:29)
Absolutely a pleasure to be on.

JoDee Curtis (26:31)
You describe your mother, which I love, as the OG MacGyver and a model of joyful resilience. Tell me about how did her example shape your understanding of hardiness and even influence your coaching philosophy?

Sarah Turner (26:49)
That’s a great question. So can I first say that there are so many people I know that don’t even know who MacGyver is. Like, don’t make me feel old. Come on. It’s true. Like growing up, I watched that show when I was a kid and my mom had this instinct about being able to take whatever was around her. And in a very calm way, she would just assemble it to make the response be fitting of the moment. And I think for me, what is probably most significant and what I got from that that’s tied to the concept of hardiness and also creating joy daily is just that she modeled it in a way that helped me see it firsthand.

I’m a visual person anyway, but what I realized is that in the last probably 20 years, one of the most significant books that I’ve read that has made a difference to me, both in my personal and my professional life, especially in coaching, is The Invisible Spotlight. I just think it’s so clever the way that that book was written that we all walk around, can’t quite see it, but it’s there in this very circle of light and everywhere we go, somebody is watching. And in this case, I just got the benefit of watching my mom’s spotlight and her application of resilience helped me realize what you do matters more than you think. It could set somebody else in motion to create habits because they’re absorbing you from them and we do, we mirror each other. And so as a coach, I’m constantly trying to make sure people realize what is your spotlight showing and what are you displaying and how is that impacting other people? Because if you grow this concept and this skillset, you could impact other people’s resilience just by being you, which is so awesome. So yeah, that’s kind of how it evolved for me, or at least the way I would represent it.

JoDee Curtis (28:27)
I love it and I wrote down that book too. I haven’t read that.

Sarah Turner (28:32)
It’s good one.

JoDee Curtis (28:32)
And you also highlight the three components of hardiness: challenge, control and commitment. Which of these do you find most difficult to maintain personally and how do you work on it?

Sarah Turner (28:32)
Well, so one of the things that I mentioned in the book, JoDee, When Women Lead, is that I do struggle… Well, I think we all struggle with all three. I think there are times in our lives where we find one of them is on the hot seat. The one that’s probably most difficult for me, both personally and professionally, is probably control. And I think part of the story there is one, well, as a mom, I’m constantly wanting more control than I probably should have. And so you’re always trying to figure out that fine balance between how much control you exert and how much it’s okay to let go of.

In a working world, I find this one is also challenging in part because sometimes we are so apt to associate our title with what we’re supposed to be doing. And I think sometimes that can really get in your way. I can’t tell you the number of people who have literally said, “Well, that’s not my job.” And I think… Wow, so because it wasn’t in something you believed was written in your job description, you’re letting go of the control. And some things just happen, and you can absolutely apply influence and value. But you’ve allowed that to help you decide to dial down your control and potentially really impact the outcomes of the moment. So I’m constantly trying for myself and then other people to let them know, think about what you can control. Sometimes it’s not necessarily a part of your responsibilities, but within the setting, your mindset, where you use your voice and how you offer support, those are all things you can control and they help you bounce back. So yeah, for me, I would probably say control. That’s my one.

JoDee Curtis (30:24)
I love that and that’s great advice too to think about what can we control.

Sarah Turner (30:31)
Right. That’s right.

JoDee Curtis (30:33)
You also mentioned that stress can be a threat or a challenge. What strategies do you recommend for shifting from a threat mindset to a challenge mindset, especially in a high-pressure situation?

Sarah Turner (30:50)
So one of the things that probably inspired me to look at the concept of stress more intentionally in this defined way is actually from Kelly McGonigal’s book, The Upside of Stress. It’s such a wonderful research study around the concept of how we look at stress. So my advice is probably step one is looking at some of the physiological factors in a moment of stress, especially when it’s dialing up fast and being mindful about how you’re defining the symptoms themselves and what they represent.

One of my examples, I came across years ago this picture of this young girl who happens to have prosthetics on both legs. And she’s in a playground and she’s about to climb one of those rock-climbing walls. And I just, love her face. It’s one of my favorite pictures. And I remember thinking, consider this moment for her. And she’s about to climb this wall. And maybe she saw two or three other peers doing the same thing, but didn’t have the same physiological stature as herself.

And she’s thinking about how her heart is racing, her palms are sweating, and our bodies will start to do very distinct things. And when you think about the difference between a threat mentality and a challenge mentality, when we see it as a threat, our heart’s racing and we define it as because we think we might not make it, because other people will laugh at us, because we probably shouldn’t be trying this. So we assume that our heart beating fast is a signal, don’t do this, it’s bad for you.

I think, and this picture just inspires me, that this little girl’s probably thinking, my heart’s beating because I want that so badly, and it’s mine, and I’m gonna get you. And instead of pulling away, she leans into the challenge, she climbs the wall, and that concept was very present. So my advice, both for myself and then anyone who is interested in thinking about how to challenge this, it’s give yourself a chance to really think about why is my body doing this? What’s the label that I get to apply as to what’s going on? And if you can attach it to meaning or some point of value you want to create, it does. It shifts you from that threat to the bring it, right? To that challenge. And it’s amazing what that does. so yeah, that’s kind of one of those pieces of advice that I always try to tell people. Give that a go. It’s really inspiring and it works well.

JoDee Curtis (33:05)
Yeah, yeah, very nice. Can you share a personal example where practicing gratitude helped you stay resilient during a tough time?

Sarah Turner (33:16)
Yeah, I know that kind of sounds backwards because in very difficult settings, why would we be thankful? Well, there’s a lot of things that go to this that I could chat about. But one that comes to mind is actually kind of going a little bit further back in my career where I didn’t even know I was practicing hardiness, but I look back and I realize, wow, it was present even back then.

But I had one of my early experiences with a group of 30 professionals, and I happened to be teaching a class on career ownership. How do you really own your career? And I was so jazzed about it. I was super excited. And I had a very seasoned person come in, grumpy as all get out, showing every sign of this wasn’t voluntary, absolutely mandatory, didn’t want to be here. And for the first probably half hour, and JoDee, I bet you’ve been in this situation too, I know I looked at him 90% of the time because I was so worried about what he was getting out of it and how he didn’t like it and how he didn’t want to be there and what can I do to change his mind? And I remember at the first break, I’m 75 minutes in and it hit me, have I looked at anybody else? Is anybody else connecting with this content?

And I remember at that time asking myself to pause and think about, okay, what did you want to get out of this and what are you grateful for in this moment? And I listed just a couple of things, not the least of which is that I felt so fortunate to get to have the role I had because teaching and partnering with others and learning is one of my favorite things to do. And I thought, there are 29 other people here. Be grateful you can connect with those 29 people. So I did. I just sort of shifted my attention away from him. And I leaned into that grateful spirit that I get a chance to give them something.

And as odd as this sounds, I got to the very end of the day and the gentleman walked up to me and he formally thanked me for my energy and the difference I was making in their company. And I remember thinking, it worked. Somehow I won him over. But I think it was because I was willing to look at something I wanted or something I was appreciative of and that channeled me to do something different. And it mattered. It was so weird. But yeah, so that gratefulness really, it almost just realigned my focus for the better. And I think sometimes that can be a simple, simple way to get back into a point of resilience.

JoDee Curtis (35:33)
Right. I love it. so true about how sometimes someone in the class is, you know, has a look on their face or seems energized or not energized and how it can be so distracting. So you just want to focus on them. I’ve done that many times. So that’s a great tool to sort of step back and be grateful. I love it. And Sarah, what’s one small daily habit someone might start today to begin building their hardiness and resilience and be able to find more joy in the work they’re doing?

Sarah Turner (36:21)
So that is such a wonderful question because there’s so many things that you could do. I mean, I’ll mention that the two that you and I have even discussed so far reframing the concept of what the elements of stress are in the moment. Going from a threat to a challenge is so powerful. Using gratefulness, very powerful. These are small things, but as basic or as simple as this sounds, often tell people awareness is the beginning. It’s the first journey of everything. And so I often tell people, if you can become more thoughtful about noticing your daily interactions, your daily experiences, and track what I often call your trends and triggers, what are the trending situations or the trigger settings that make you feel less resilient, like make you feel like you want to exert less control, you want to dial down your commitment, or you don’t even want to take the challenge?

And then look comparatively at the trending settings that do in fact make you want to lean in and then kind of dissect the difference. What you’ll find is you can borrow from one side to the other and it typically can amplify the way that you take in the moments in the future just because you reflected today. So I know that sounds silly, but again, something as basic as reflection to get you ready for future moments is a wonderful basic daily step that can help.

I mean, the other thing I will say is that I decided as we got through this process that I have so many of those little daily tips that I love that on the landing page that I created because we got to partner together and create a little bit of a conversation around this via the When Women Lead book. I just put a bunch of tips. if you’re interested, that is something that I would suggest that you explore because I think that there are tips in two ways. There’s a set of tips that you can use daily to grow your own resilience. But for many of us, we are in a position to impact and influence other people. And so I also created a how to lead others to resilience. So I’ve got kind of a two split space of resources. So just keep looking for them, I guess is another daily tip. Don’t stop looking for extra tools to grow your hardiness or your resilience. They’re there. They are there.

JoDee Curtis (38:30)
Wonderful advice as always. So how can our listeners reach out to you if they want to hear more or learn more about this?

Sarah Turner (38:41)
So I always tell people that clearly there are some basic ways or easy ways to get a hold of me. My website, luminoleadership.com is a great place to start that has the ability to click contact me. So I would love to connect. LinkedIn, another great source that I would suggest that you consider reaching out and looking. Of course, I always tell people at this point, take a peek at the When Women Lead resources. There’s such a great blend of information inside of the book. And I would love to have that be a starting point for… reading the chapter, that’s a great starting point too. But yes, reach out, I would love to connect. If you’re curious or interested, I’d love to be a partner of thought in this space of resilience.

JoDee Curtis (39:19)
Yes, thank you so much and I’m so excited to have partnered with you on this book. Looking forward to…

Sarah Turner (39:29)
Yeah, me too. Ditto.

Susan White (39:32)
JoDee, we have a listener question. What is the best training tool that this team has found with the shift from in-person training to remote training programs?

JoDee Curtis (39:43)
Yeah, so I think in general, just want to say that although when I do live training, my goal is always to focus on engagement of the group, right? And make sure members are not just sitting and listening to me talk. I want to have interaction. I want to have conversations. I want to hear different thoughts. And I think that’s even more true when we’re remote.

So I think our focus should be on almost doubling the engagement. I don’t know about you, Susan, but I have a hard time concentrating when I’m doing remote training. And so when I’m teaching, I’m almost assuming that people aren’t paying attention. So just want to do anything I can to ask questions and engage them. Now, some specific tools I use, we use Teams software for our internal workings of Purple Ink, but for training, I use Zoom. I think it has a lot more functions and options available to keep the participants engaged.

I also like surveys. There’s lots of different survey tools out there, whether it’s built into Zoom or doing other types of surveys where people can scan a QR code or go to a website and get the pulse of the room. You know, it’s one thing to say what are your thoughts on this but another to actually have people go vote or give their opinion on that I think is engaging for people that actually see it, to see the results live. What about you, Susan? I think you, don’t you use a tool called Whiteboard?

Susan White (41:47)
Yeah, and certainly the different platforms will often have either they’ll call it whiteboard or something else where the participants can type in answers. you could do, know, instead of having it in the chat box, which does get a little stale, right? With people constantly responding to the chat box, it lets them draw pictures. It lets them do things more graphically. So I do like that.

I’m also a big fan of breakout rooms. I think when you’re doing virtual learning, sometimes there’s gonna be people in the room who just aren’t comfortable in front of 40 other people or whatever number you have expressing their opinions. But if you can put them one-on-one with somebody else or even in a small group, you get a chance for them to open up and to connect, especially if the group doesn’t know each other very well, you can have them do some exercises where they actually connect and build out their network. So I’m a big fan of breakout rooms.

I will tell you that for my training that I do now, I usually use Zoom, but I had used Adobe Connect, and I sent people to breakout rooms that I think are still out there waiting for me to find them and bring them back into the classroom. I was horrible at it, just horrible. But with Zoom, I find it so intuitive. Those breakout rooms are just great. I can drop in. I could drop out. I just, there’s so many things I love about it, but I don’t endorse any particular platform. I’ve just had a lot better luck with Zoom. So if you’re a listener and I sent you to a breakout room in a class I taught, please forgive me. Go ahead and leave, the class is over.

JoDee Curtis (43:15)
Now it’s time for In the News. An international study published in March 2025 exploring the long-term relationship between job and life satisfaction shows that personal happiness is the major driver for a satisfying work life and not the other way around. Now, when I read this the first time I had to read through this like three times before I got it, but once I got it, I loved it. So I’m going to say that again. Personal happiness is the driver for a satisfying work life.

The finding published in the Journal of Organizational Behavior challenges conventional thinking that job satisfaction has a stronger influence on life satisfaction than life satisfaction has on job satisfaction. And it provides crucial insights for employers about the importance of work-life integration.

Researchers from the US, Germany, and South Australia analyzed data from more than 160,000 people across multiple global studies, demonstrating how the intertwined paths of job and life satisfaction shift and shape each other over time. The study found that individuals with higher life satisfaction were 32% more likely to experience increased job satisfaction over time. While job satisfaction does have a positive effect on future life satisfaction, it’s a comparatively weaker, and it diminishes over time. Thought that was very interesting.

Susan White (45:18)
Very interesting.

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