Episode 2 Trailer

Managers are people too and when layoffs occur, managers can find themselves not only supporting their team through this difficult time, but their peers too - all the while possibly having a tough time themselves.

In this episode, our guest is Danielle O'Meara, who is - was - the manager of a Customer Success Management team in a large multinational tech company. In the years following the Covid pandemic, like a social contagion, large scale layoffs have spread throughout the tech industry.

Danielle shares her experience of, together with her team, being made redundant in 2022. How did she manage? What got her through it? And as she imagines herself in the future, having lived through many more challenging experiences to come, what does she want to be known for?

In a world where people, especially women, are encouraged to lean in, and most of us grapple with the challenges of saying ‘No’ to all sorts of things that come our way, Danielle reflects on the benefit and impact of ‘stepping back’.

This is a short bonus episode of a part of my conversation with Danielle O’Meara that didn’t make it into the main episode but that I think you might appreciate. So, we skip the introductions and dive straight in.  

INTRO

The bloodbath continues for tech employees. Apple. Meta. Salesforce. Alphabet. Microsoft. Amazon. Twitter. Stripe. Tesla.  150,000 tech workers have been laid off in 2022 alone. 

Danielle (Guest): Spoiler alert. That is actually what ended up happening to our entire team.  I was the first person who got the email. All the Slack messages start rolling in from the team saying, I got the email. I got the email. I got the email.  And it was incredibly sad and heartbreaking for all of us, but it was also really beautiful. 

Belinda (Host): The years following the COVID pandemic saw multiple rounds of redundancies taking place in the tech industry. In 2022 in particular, company after company across the globe, large and small, announced layoffs.  For many, it felt like a relentless social contagion as announcements of cuts kept coming. In most cases, employees could only watch and wait. Would they be next? In this episode of the manager's moment, we hear from one team manager about her experience, and what made the difference to her is she and her team got that dreaded email.

Belinda (Host): My guest today is …

Danielle (Guest): Danielle O'Meara from Dublin, Ireland.  Pretty early on, I started my career in retail. So, I was a sales assistant in a small art supply store. My last job was managing a team of customer success managers in a US Multinational software telecommunications organisation. 

Belinda (Host): Managers are people too, but it's convenient to make them the baddie in our own work life. And so we don't tend to be open to hearing from them about their unique spot in the world. This closes us off from learning and growing from their perspective.  In this podcast, we pause to give managers Just and their peers the opportunity to reflect on a moment they encountered and the legacy they hope to leave over time.  This is The Manager's Moment, and I am your host, Belinda Brummer. 

Danielle (Guest): Hi, Belinda.

Belinda (Host): Hello, Danielle. 

Belinda (Host): I started out by asking Danielle to tell us a little bit about herself.

Danielle (Guest): I'm one of these people who would really admit to being a people pleaser. I'm trying to, I suppose, temper that a bit. It's not always easy Position to be in, I think, and it can be detrimental in many situations.

So always even as a child, a very, very young child in School. Being the kid who's just, like, always wanted to please the teacher and get good feedback and and terrified of negative feedback And being reprimanded and and disciplined and all of that kind of stuff. So I always grew up as a really well behaved  child, But with a real fear of  disappointing.  I think back to every management role that I've been in and and typically you would think like, Okay. Yes.

If you're a people pleaser, you're trying to please, like, the authority figure, like, your leaders, your customers, your whoever, your stakeholders. But actually, 1 of the biggest I don't know if I should say fears, but the the the people that I always wanted to please the most Would have been my direct reports. And that that wouldn't make me kind of the most not anxious necessarily, but I guess that was almost to the fore. It was like, what do these this group of people, I'm their leader, I'm their manager, what do they think about me, or am I doing a good job, and do they think I'm rubbish, or am I actually helpful to them, and what do they get from this relationship?  My management, be it of the customer or of people, it's always to do with managing a relationship.

And so those skills, I think, you know, you might utilize them in different ways. But at their core, it's listening to, you know, what is the goal of this person or this organization?  Is it feasible? Yes or no? Do we agree a path forward? Yes. Hopefully. And then it's navigating that path with them. And I think that that's very … you're using that same kind of framework whether it's an employee or a customer or an organization that you're serving. It's all about working with people at the end of the day in my area of expertise.

I think a lot of people, especially those who've never been in a management role, feel like there's this element of power at play and that the manager has all the power and that's why people want to become managers: to have power over other people to tell them what to do and to reprimand them or whatever. And that's … I just don't think that could be further from the truth in reality in my case. Because it all has felt like it's another service role, but you're just in service of a different group of people. In my case, I had five direct reports and each of them completely different. Different stages in their careers, in different countries, different cultures, different languages, you know, just different personalities at a basic level. And you almost have to work, like, five times harder because you have to address the needs of these five individuals.

And you want them to be happy. You want them to stay with the company. You want them to feel like you're helping them, and that there's a benefit in you being their manager.  When you think about what you expect and what others expect of the manager, how does service show up there for you?  I mean, there's different layers to that, I think.

So, the very basic stuff is, like, do the kind of the admin side of the role to keep people's holidays approved and tick all those boxes that go along with someone's employment to make sure everything's in check and that they're getting what they need from the business and the resources at hand. And then aside from blast, there's their day-to-day experiences doing their job, where in the larger company that I've just, um, Been working out most recently, say, navigating different teams and are looking for help or resources or input from other teams could often be really tricky. It was quite a siloed organization. So …  we were structured in such a way that my reports would come to me and say, hey, I need your help leveraging your level in the company. You're at management level …can you go and speak to this person's manager and get them to do what I need them to do? So it almost became, like, a level of advocacy or, like, politics to try and negotiate or navigate what ultimately the end customer needed. They would use us, the managers, as another resource to essentially get what was needed within the company. 

Belinda (Host): One of the things that I really pay attention to in my own life, and I wonder whether you have noticed this in your life, that there are themes that repeat themselves In different contexts, in different stages of your life, or that there is a thread that runs through most of your experiences that Connects them or connects you to them. Do you have any themes or threads that you've noticed that appear and occur in your work life? 

Danielle (Guest): I do. Yeah. So, basically, all of my career experience has essentially been customer facing and with a little bit of kind of management roles thrown into that. And the main thing, I suppose, across both of those elements is relationships and relationship building and just the variety within that and how as a manager, I've had to adapt  To each individual  relationship via direct report or customer that you encounter.

Belinda (Host): When you think of relationship in the workplace, what does that mean to you? What shape does that take? Can you give us a bit of insight into how you think about relationships in work?

Danielle (Guest): The biggest word that comes to mind straight away is just empathy. And I'm a big advocate of making space for a person in a conversation.

In my most recent team, I had five direct reports, each of them in different locations across Europe. It was a remote team. So conversation and active listening and those listening skills are so important because you don't have that in person ability to read somebody, um, their body language and how they are in person. So the screen really filtering that out Made it so important to really actively deliberately create space for each person and hear what they're saying. And I think I'm lucky in a sense that I have some natural empathy, but it's also a skill that I've had to build upon throughout my career.

I try, and I know the might sound a little bit trite, but, like, literally putting yourself in somebody else's shoes. And it does help. Right? Because I worked as a customer success manager I worked in a lot of customer facing roles before becoming a manager in that realm And even with some of my direct reports in particular, I had managed some of their clients previously.

So that's always a good starting point, and that was always kind of a good way to I suppose start building a relationship … on a bond with each direct report. 

Belinda (Host): Which brings us back to that thing that you said, which was so captivating about being a manager, whether that is, you know, working with a customer and being a customer success manager or a people manager,  It is a service role. Yeah. Add to that these things that you're talking about in terms of creating space, deliberately creating space, Listening. Conversations. Relationship.  Can you maybe give us a bit of insight into what that looks like on a day-to-day basis for you?

Danielle (Guest): It's something that I've always just assumed happens in every single kind of managers schedule or day to day, but I've learned is not. And perhaps it's just … I've been lucky to have been exposed to or learn from really good managers in my in my own career kind of before I became one. Is making sure that there is and this is getting very, like, admin heavy, but, like, a one-on-one meeting with each person on the calendar, once a week. And, like, even if that's 15 minutes or half an hour, and in my experience with my most recent team, it could have gone from literally a 15 minute check-in with one person, and another person might need you for 90 minutes. There's such a variety in that, and I think that example just shows, like, people need you in different ways, and they need different things from you. And some need more support and some need less and feel like they just need to run something by you and go off and they feel confident doing their own thing.

There's different reasons why people, like, need more or less time, and, obviously, that can, like, fluctuate through the weeks and the months and the years. But I think the key thing is making sure that that time is there, that they can count on that. Like, that is a static fixture in their week That they know even though that they can kind of come and grab you for a chat or a check-in at some point, you know, ad hoc. There's always that time in your calendar that is theirs.  And I've always appreciated that as an individual contributor as well when I've had that time with my managers, and I think there's a … it does demonstrate a mutual respect.

I think it's really disappointing sometimes, you know, if you have a leader, if you are reporting to somebody and You were supposed to have time with them on a kind of a standing basis, and they are constantly moving it around or rescheduling or counselling and saying, oh, you don't really need to talk to me, do you. And that kind of stuff like … that is so disheartening, I find, just on a personal level. Like, that that shows a kind of a disrespect for a person's time. And I think the key to that is, like, now I've just mentioned, like, mutual respect, and it's moving, I think from this old school impression that a manager is more powerful than an individual contributor.

And I really just disagree with that because to go back to you know, what we've spoken about … the idea of a manager being in service to other people. Like, you are a resource and a service  for your direct reports. They need you, and therefore, you need to be available to them. And it's not about, like, you have power over these people because you're controlling their workload or you're telling them what to do or you're kind of assigning and reassigning a task or products Portfolio, customer accounts, and things like that. Like, yes, you do have responsibility over that, but that shouldn't create a really apparent power dynamic in that relationship.

That's my personal opinion. I know others may disagree. Um, I I suppose I'm speaking from my experience in kind of customer facing roles where I've seen the most success across, like, the variety of different Work patterns, personalities, and my own teams is when I'm almost being guided by what do my Reports need from me because they are all different individuals, and they need different things at different times as well. And sometimes they might not want you at all, but you have to be okay with that too.  Yeah.

Belinda (Host): And what I'm hearing is that no matter how many or how few people you're managing, whether they're customers or individuals.  You have a different relationship with every single one of them. For sure. Regardless of how … kind of generic or replicated the roles are within the team. People are people and everybody brings completely different needs and perspectives to their role, to what they need, when they need it.  Could you maybe bring it to life for us? How does relationship show up for you in the things that you do and maybe talk us through something that will help us visualize that or understand that?

BREAK

Belinda (Host): The Manager's Moment is brought to you by Boost Learning, where management development is done differently.  Our 8-week programs are designed to fit perfectly around your schedule, your experience, and your development needs, all delivered online and virtually.  To find out more, go to www.boostlearning.online. 

RETURN

Belinda (Host): In this episode, we are talking to Danielle O'Meara, the manager of a customer success team. Before the break, she spoke of the importance of relationship with managing team members or customers. At the core of her experience is relationship.  I asked her to bring it to life to help us understand how this shows up for her.

Danielle (Guest): I'll talk about maybe the final year in my most recent organization.  Working in the tech industry, many people would be familiar with what 2022 looked like across a lot of tech companies with just huge amounts of layoffs and reorganizations and uncertainty. Coming out of COVID in particular, business models shifting from the new normal as it was called back then to well, okay, we'll go back to the, maybe, not-so-new normal or a hybrid of the old normal of the new normal.

But there was just such a huge degree of worry and uncertainty throughout the industry,  gaining through the year. And so for me and my team, that was really building. And where the relationship element comes into play, I suppose, is … so say I'm managing five different people.  And some of them are just kind of head in the sand. I'm not listening to any of this nonsense.

And it's, like, I'm trying to kinda check-in on them but not cause any concerns. So that's a very delicate balance with those kind of people. And then you might have others where they're getting to almost like conspiracy theory level of investigation on, like, what's going on? And I need to know this, and this, and this person told me this. And I'm hearing this from other people and, like, secondhand rumours and all this kind of stuff.

I'm, like, trying to then manage that person in a different way.  And then you have others where it's like, yeah, this could all happen, but, uh, my focus is on the job at hand, and I'm not losing sight of that. And I'm just so determined to get things done and work for my customers. So that's kind of maybe three different examples, but I suppose my point is … Those are very disparate challenges, in terms of managing people. And the only way really that you can get through that is by having a strong foundation of a relationship with each of those people because you would just go crazy trying to, like, find a one size fits all approach to keeping your team sort of focused in check and, like, working on what they need to work on, making sure that they're well, And their mental health is not suffering because of this air of uncertainty around.

And meanwhile, as a manager, you're also hearing things, and you're also in the same situation that they are in. You also have your own doubts. You're like, I have my own tendencies towards trying to read the signs or find things out. You're also talking to other managers you know, their teams, you're hearing things.

And so you're trying to figure it out. At that level, but then not let onto your team, you're also trying to reassure them without giving them too much hope and not making any promises or commitments that are going to just turn around and bite you afterwards. So there's, like, a really delicate line to walk.  And each of your reports are so individual that you really do need that strong relationship and understanding of each individual person in order to tailor your approach to each of them as well.

Belinda (Host): That relationship would have had to be built well before the storm hit. Before the rumours and the layoffs start happening. Not even yet, you know, in your organization, it's just out there in the industry. So, there's nothing to anchor it on. And therefore, before we get to 2022, you have had to build those relationships. And in some cases, with new employees or as you quickly move into a role, build those relationships really quickly.

Danielle (Guest): Absolutely. So in my team, there were three that I had worked with as a peer prior to becoming a manager. So, I had that existing relationship with them. I had that understanding of how they worked and that they knew how I worked.

They were getting to know me as a manager, but I still got a good sense of how they work. You still learn new things actually when you step into that managerial role because the dynamic of the conversation shifts a lot. And you're hearing more of their … some people are more frank with you when you're their manager, and others are a little bit more guarded.  I did actually have two new starters probably halfway through 2022 coming into the organization.

And that summer, it was kind of like, okay, that sort of air of uncertainty was building, but it hadn't quite hit us yet.  So, I'm trying to onboard these two people, and they're totally … one's in Spain, one's in Germany. And, like, I haven't met them. We're just trying to connect over Zoom and stuff like that. Like, I spent a lot of time in meetings with both of them. Trying to get to know them, but also really help them,  a) onboard, which is tricky you're joining a new company and stuff like that, but, b) they try to address the elephant in the room or just keep it at bay a little bit. One of them was, like, never talked about it.

Anytime I would check-in or gently raise the topic to see how they were feeling, no issues. Didn't want to talk about it at all. And the other was, like, constantly asking: “I've been told when I joined this organisation that everything was steady and stable, and everything's fine and no worries. Um, and there's lots of growth opportunities and things like that.”

And then they join and suddenly this … the sense of anticipation is just kind of building and building. And, ultimately, we did go through a layoff in September 2023. Now, none of our team was affected, thankfully in that one, but it was still earth shattering a little bit in our very happy team, to be honest. Like, we all got on really, really well. To go through that was very difficult because a lot of the teams that we relied on around us had been impacted.

So just in terms of the day-to-day job became so much more difficult for everybody, especially dealing with customers and answering their questions and trying to make sure you're not scaring them off, or you're not saying anything that's not true. And each person trying to manage the customer is in a really tricky spot coming out of that because you're trying to manage your own emotions and fears and frustrations and then keep everything ticking over and like a duck where everything's moving on the surface of the water, but furiously paddling underneath to just keep everything going.

Belinda (Host): And you know, the story will resonate with so many people out there, whether you're a manager or not a manager, and particularly if you're in the tech industry, but other industries and other companies and organisations as well. In these conversations, I like to look at you, the manager, as you are navigating this. The lead up to you to be able to stand strong in that storm and to be person that other people around you needed you to be in that moment.

It's very different from your everyday management activities and focus where you're focused on just getting the best out of people and creating the environment for them to flourish, etcetera.  When you've got this storm, when you're in the eye of that storm, but it it's not really the eye because the storm hasn't even hit yet, but you've heard the storm is coming. Or is it? It's not. It's a very different situation, and yet you are there having to be the person everybody needs to be to create stability.

Where in your own journey did you learn to do that? that enabled you to be that person for your team?

Danielle (Guest): The first thing is the people that I was surrounded with and my peers. So, our team is structured with three managers, and each of us had a team for different segments. So, I really was very lucky to have just fantastic peers in that management team, and the three of us leaned on each other an awful lot during that period.  I had also been through a smaller layoff in previous organisation, so it wasn't the first time that I had been through something like that.

That helps a bit, I think, just when it's not the first time something like this happens. And it's still a shock, of course, and it's still awful  

To go through the experience of seeing friends and colleagues and other teams  departing the business, and some of them quite suddenly and some of them quite in a drawn out process where it's very uncertain for a long period of time, and that's due to the, for example, the Irish and EU and UK legislation around mass redundancies. So that can take a couple of months. Periods, etcetera.

Danielle (Guest): Exactly.

You know, that you need a long period of consultation before you can enact something. So, people sit with the knowledge that something might happen to them.

Danielle (Guest): Yeah.

Belinda (Host): That they may or may not be able to influence for a very long time.

Danielle (Guest): Exactly. Yeah.

Belinda (Host): Mhmm. 

Danielle (Guest): And so that's very, very difficult. And

Belinda (Host): We should say for our audience outside of this jurisdiction that a consultation period is a good thing in that it is supposed to, when being used correctly, enable people to be part of the conversation and that things are not just done to them, but that they have the power to influence and that they can be part of that conversation. Or at the very least, not be blindsided by something. My experience is that most of the time, that is a very long time for people to sit with that level of insecurity.

And it doesn't always go well for the individual in that they struggle emotionally, mentally. They take great strain. So, it can be a really difficult time, more difficult because that consultation period can be so long.

Danielle (Guest): And I could actually skip forward and say, you know, spoiler alert, that is actually what ended up happened to our whole team.  

We can say to our teams, your job is the safest immediately after a layoff in an attempt to kind of reassure them, but then very quickly, we started hearing things kind of at the manager level and above that there were kind of mutterings even, like, a month or two later. Um, so there was a very, very extremely brief respite from all of the rumours and the and the uncertainty, and then it really started to pick up again. And it just built and built and built, and the rumour mill was absolutely flying until about the middle of February 2023 we  received an email. I can't even remember what day it was. An email went out to the entire company basically saying, “Loo, there's another round of layoffs happening, and you'll find out within the next x number of hours - I think it was 2 or 3 hours for people in Europe and UK - whether your role is at risk or terminated.”

And I remember very distinctly being on a  call with, uh, myself and the other managers and our director, and I was the first person who got the email. And then very quickly,  all the Slack messages start rolling in from the team saying, I got the email. I got the email. I got the email. And very, very soon after that, we kind of deduced, okay. Our entire team is at risk, and not just us, but our extended team all across the globe. So that was tricky. That day was incredibly difficult because, firstly, on an individual basis, everybody's kinda going, “oh my god.” You're just in complete shock when you got that email. And for those of us in the EU, well, except for Germany - the German rules basically say that there is no consultation period, so termination is effective immediately. The same in the US.  But for Ireland, UK, Spain, and I think Australia, there is a consultation period applied.

That day, we had to very quickly say goodbye to our German colleagues, I had two German team members reporting to me. They were let go immediately, and the majority of our global team were terminated that day as well. The next day, it was just a much smaller group of us left and just left with this incredible amount of uncertainty that we were all going into separate consultation periods.  Logistically, that's pretty tricky as well because each of the … so I mentioned there were three of us managers. Our teams were divided by where our customers were based, but not where our team members were based.

So we each had team members spread all across Europe.  Trying to go through those and learn about all the different legal processes in each of those jurisdictions. I'm trying to support my team through just receiving this awful news and that ongoing through the process, figuring out what  are the ins and outs of going through this consultation period.  Because what's really unfortunate about us is that there is an expectation that you maintain your day to day duties. And that is really confusing in a situation like ours where we're customer facing.

So for our Customer Success Managers still having meetings with customers.  Like, what what do you … they're how do you even tell them that you're going through this massive upheaval … and trying to really process that, but at the same time, keep things ticking over for a customer.  And represent a company who's just told you you might not be here very much longer. That's a really tricky thing to navigate. And people deal with that very differently. And some people are committed to, like, the nth degree.

And will just keep going and keep going because maybe they have hope that if they work hard enough, their job will be saved and they'll be able to stick around or move into a different team or different role, and then others just give up And do the absolute bare minimum. And at that point, like, as a manager, you're going, well, if someone just doesn't do work anymore, like, what can I do about that? They're already in a consultation process. There isn't really … very difficult to put to, like, start going through some sort of disciplinary or managing performance when they're already in the situation? And not alone that, but I'm also in it too.

So there's that processing and that personal impact for me, to be honest, it almost took a back seat because there was a huge sense of camaraderie as a whole going through this and certainly at the beginning. The consultation periods lasted different lengths of time, roughly around the same, but people could choose to sign separation agreements at different times, and so some people started dropping off after a couple of weeks, and the numbers are dwindling and dwindling and dwindling.  So initially, there is that sense of, like, well, we're all in this together and, you know, something positive through a situation like that is having a great team and having the relationships that we've built with each other as managers and peers through the short time, honestly, that we've, uh, worked together in the context of our working lives, it's pretty remarkable, I think. We were very, very lucky.

And those relationships too, by and large, have maintained outside of when we all parted and moved on to other roles and other things in life. Then to still keep in touch is wonderful as well. To have gone through something like that, it does maintain kind of a bond with people because it's something that, like, if you haven't really gone through it, it's hard to understand how that actually feels.

Belinda (Host): And this is a shared experience and shared experiences, whether they are dramatic, traumatic, experiences, whether they are dramatic, traumatic, or ecstatic, they tend to bond us in that moment and those bonds, if nurtured, can continue. But relationship is what it's all about.

But it sounds like a logistical nightmare and really, really complex. I don't even want to think about how the HR department was dealing with all of that. But the people managers and the people like you who were experiencing it for yourself, but trying to hold other people while they were going through this process as well, for such a long time, what got you through all of that other than the relationships that you had with your peers and with the people that you were supporting? What got you through it?

Danielle (Guest): The main thing for me, honestly, was the friendship that I built with my fellow managers because it's just something that was so invaluable. It's very unusual to have that kind of team structure that we did, I think. The three of us had managed and worked with a lot of the team members, and we had very similar experiences in terms of managing different people. And one of the other managers had previously managed some of my team. So, we'd always had a lot of help and support going back and forth between the three of us.

We had built a really nice bond through just sharing things about our lives, not keeping this barrier up between work and personal life. We're very lucky in that we had that really comfortable dynamic, and we still are friends to this day. And I didn't know them all that long. It's one of those things that kind of comes along once in a while that you just feel very lucky that it evolves in that way, which is a huge amount of support for each other.

Belinda (Host): That notion of sharing.

Danielle (Guest): Yeah.

Belinda (Host): That is about reciprocity.  And that is at the heart of relationship.

Danielle (Guest): Yeah.

Belinda (Host): It is about not just taking or not just giving. And that comes down to information and stories about ourselves and stories about other people.

Danielle (Guest): Yeah.

Belinda (Host): And it is reciprocity. Having been a Customer Success Manager myself, I know you cannot be a Customer Success Anything … you can't deal with the customer if all you are are a vessel that takes things in.

Danielle (Guest): Yeah.

Belinda (Host): Um, because the customer feels that void. They feel the emptiness there. And it can be, you know, it's not a nice place to be.

Danielle (Guest): Yeah.

Belinda (Host): Whereas relationship  is reciprocal and so you do need to share for others to feel safe to share with you.

Danielle (Guest): Yeah.

Belinda (Host): And It goes beyond authenticity about being able to show up as yourself, but it is about being generous with yourself appropriately for the moment and for the relationship. Mhmm.

Danielle (Guest): And there's a there's something as well in sharing vulnerability.  And one of the strongest memories I have from that first day that we got the news that our roles were all at risk is we all, as a wider team, got on a Zoom call, and  I would say the majority of … everybody who had their cameras on, we were all crying. We were all visibly emotional and collectively so, which was just so remarkable to me. Like, there is so much empathy and sensitivity and just vulnerability in that moment. And when I think about how organisations are pushing for return to office because they're saying there's no connection.

You like .. “that it's hard to build relationships and connection through remote working or through Zoom calls” and that being kind of your mode of working. I, like, that is the moment for me that completely counteracts that argument because I'm sitting alone in my kitchen having received that news, But I'm not alone. And I might have tears streaming down my face and shock, like, coursing through my body, but I know and I can see it on everybody else's face as well. I know that we all feel in this together.  And it was incredibly sad and heartbreaking for all of us, but it was also really beautiful.

Someone took a screenshot, which is really funny. You know, it was really sad. But there was that beautiful thing. All these relationships have been formed. This team that had come together through, like, a corporate organisation, but it just meant so much more than that.

Yeah. I, like, I don't think about that experience as anything negative, necessarily, anymore. I think I'm just … it sounds so cheesy … but really grateful that that group of people got to know each other and got to work with each other. And not just … I'm thinking of, like, the relationships that I've formed, but being able to bear witness to the other relationships and the other friendships that have been formed just through working together, like people that I've hired and people that other managers have hired, coming together and forming friendships that probably last a lifetime. Like, done magic. That's really lovely. 

Belinda (Host): Wow. Do you know? I've learned so much from this conversation myself. Just the power of relationship.

Danielle (Guest): Yeah.

Belinda (Host): Like, honestly, and the power of relationship, the importance of sharing, the value of peers you are in relationship with and you relate to, the critical element of conversations, and making space for the individual in those conversations by you stepping back. 

Last question for you, Danielle. To encapsulate not only the years of experience you have through college and the retail jobs, all the way up to your most recent experience on your maternity leave, but equally the next 10 to 20 years of your life and your working career. As you think about that person in the future, what do you think that person will want to be known for?

Danielle (Guest): The one word I can think of is leader. Well, I'll explain that a little bit. I'm not I'm not the kind of person that needs to climb a ladder. But I believe very strongly that a leader does not need to be a manager.  So, a leader can be within a team or managing a team.  Whether you're leading from a work perspective or a personal perspective or just morale perspective. There's so many different elements that play there.

It's a role, I suppose, that I find I naturally step into, but it's also a part where I feel like  can give the most value. And, therefore, where I get my satisfaction from in any job is being somebody who can actually, again, be of service to other people. I guess coming back to our theme of relationships, it's like, that's where I'm happiest in my work life - is building that up. I'm feeling like I'm contributing to somebody else's experience at work in a positive way. 

Belinda (Host): Perfect.  And on that note.

OUTRO

Belinda (host): We've come to the end of another episode of The Manager's Moment. Thank you for listening. If you've enjoyed it, there are three things you could do. Let your friends and colleagues know about it. Follow the show and be a part of the conversation. And make connections by joining The Manager's Moment Club on LinkedIn. The Manager's Moment -seeing the person in this and every moment. Oh, uh, and a shout out to Boost Learning where management development is done differently. To find out more, go to www.boostlearning.online.