How to Become a Respected Leader Without Overworking or People-Pleasing

Welcome, welcome, welcome in everyone. Um, hey, so welcome to how to be a respected leader without working long

hours or kissing ass, which is the fun bit. Let me know in the chat box where in the world are you joining us from. So

get used to the chat box. Learn where it is. I'll type in there. Hey guys, we've got London. Oh, London. Love it. Scarra,

so close to Doncaster here. If you might if you know um Glasgow, London, South Coast, Netherlands, Nepal, beautiful.

Cape Town, Toronto, South Africa, Coventry, Singapore. Oh my god, London by way of NZ, New Zealand. It must be

early, very early in the morning for you. Malaga, oh my god, Harfordshire. Wow. Incredible. Incredible. Got

hundreds of messages in the chat. So, just honored, honored, honored that you're here today, guys. I'm going to

jump straight in because I know how busy we all are. You know where that chat box is. Um, so welcome. How to be a

respected leader without working long hours or kitting ass. So, I am not going to cover anything else in this session

today. So, it's going to be so um short, so hyperfocused. So, if this isn't exactly what you're looking for, I

suggest you drop out now. But for the rest of you who do want to achieve this, can I just get a yes in the chat? Just

let me know you're there. Warm you up. Just drop a big yes in the chat. Oh god, it's popping off. Amazing. This is the

biggest webinar I've ever done, guys. Um I normally do it to a few hundred people. We've got coming up on a

thousand people. I'm not even going to look at that number because it's going to freak me out. So, I'm going to

pretend it's just me and you, just two of us. Um, so yeah, so I know you are all busy managers just like me. So, like

I said, we've got a very very um short and fast session. I think the learning will be about 40 minutes long and then

we'll have enough time to do Q&A at the end. So, stick around for that. And just a quick heads up so there are no

surprises whatsoever. At the end, I'm going to take about three minutes of your time to share something that we are

launching in February for Fresh Leadership World. I'm going to sell it to you. So, if you don't like sales, I

will warn you when we get to that part and you can drop out. Everything between now and then is purely education and

I've got nothing to sell to you. Um, so that'll be right towards the end. Um, so yes, my unofficial promise to you today

is to give you everything, to give you all my energy, to answer every question that you have. All I need from you is to

be engaged in the chat. I know it is so so easy and some of you may have already done this 3 minutes in to when

especially when you're on a Zoom webinar. Nip over to your email tab, nip onto your I don't know, WhatsApp,

Instagram, do some scrolling. It's so easy. All I need is your attention for 40 minutes, probably even 39 minutes

now. Um, so yeah, someone said they've already done it. Okay, well I've got you, Trish. So stay with me. Okay, if

you have any questions as we go through this, I want you to drop them in the Q&A box. So I'm going to get to that at the

end. Don't drop it in the chat box because it's really hard for me to um look at it. But there's another box, a

Q&A box. There should be um in Zoom. Drop it in there and we'll get to them at the end. Okay. So, in order to become

a respected leader without working long hours or kissing ass, you need something I call a leadership level up matrix.

Now, this is a very clear personalized matrix. And by the end of this session, it's going to look every one of you is

going to have something that looks a little bit like this. Okay? It's a four-step matrix. There's only four

components to these. Leadership is messy. It is scary. I always think it can feel like a minefield because we're

dealing with people and people are complex. People are difficult. And I have spent the last two years, three

years really trying to simplify what we actually need to know about leadership versus what is just noise. And so these

are the four components today. You're going to take away one small action for each of these components and that will

make up your leadership level up matrix. So if you've got a notepad, I want you to draw one of these on there. this

fourstep matrix and you're going to take away actions for each of these sections. Okay? So, if you can just begin to work

on and eventually master these four, you will be head and shoulders above the rest already. So, as managers, we have

so much to deal with. We've got time pressure. Um, just feeling like there's never enough time to work on the big

picture because we are so buried in the day-to-day. And I've been there. I'm still there now. It's this real juggling

act between important and urgent big projects and client work, the leading and the day-to-day doing. So, we have

this time pressure. We also have accountability. So, just trying to get our team to care and take ownership of

their work without us feeling like we constantly have to step in, check in on them, is it done yet? Has it been done

to this standard? Do without micromanaging essentially. We also got feedback. So, making sure that we are

honest, we are clear, we are direct and also empathetic at the same time. Um and then when they don't take that feedback

well, we've got conflict and that in itself is really tough. Most of us have spent our entire life avoiding conflict

and that's completely normal. And so all of that is whilst doing our actual job. So often we still are very much hands-on

with the technical stuff, the things we did before we had any of this managerial responsibility. And whilst we're trying

to manage this, we have this nagging question in the back of our mind which is am I good enough? Am I good enough at

this job? I don't feel like these are the questions I had. I wasn't born to be a leader. I don't have the confidence to

be a leader. I don't know if I have the right the right mindset. I don't know if I have the, you know, right skills, the

right tools. When I got my first ever management job on the Harage shop floor, I was an assistant manager in a small

team of eight people. I just did not feel like I deserved a management position in any way, shape, or form. I

wasn't set up for success either. But even just inside of me, I had this deep feeling and it really does go back to

imposter syndrome. This deep feeling of just am I good enough? Am I leading properly? Constantly thinking someone

was going to catch me out at any given minute. And I think when we are in these roles, we put so much pressure on

ourselves and people expect us to have all the answers. We expect ourselves to know everything, be quickwitted, you

know, give the right feedback at the right time and if someone comes back to us, you know, have the right thing to

say. We put so much pressure on ourselves to solve every single issue that comes up all whilst being, you

know, pulled into those meetings, managing up, it's a big one, firefighting, hitting targets. And guys,

I know it is exhausting. And honestly, for most of us, when we got these roles, we weren't set up for success in the

first place. We are barely given any training. In fact, only 15, so one five% of managers ever get any formal

training. And something that used to bug me was I used to think you had to be born with it. And I didn't think that I

was. I was like, you have to be born with whatever this leadership, charisma, confidence, whatever it is, it's

something you're born with. But over time, I really started to learn leadership is a skill set. Yes, it

requires tools. It requires frameworks. It requires that, you know, sprinkling of courage and a shift in mindset, but

it's a skill set. And in today's session, I'm going to give you those skills, all the skills you need to build

a really, really, really solid foundation to become what we know today as the respected inspiring leader. You

can learn it. You have to do the work. You have to put in the work, but you can learn it. Okay. Fourstep leadership

level matrix. Now, I want to highlight the most important part of today's promise to you, which is this part.

Really important part of this session because it yes, you know, there are many routes to becoming a highly respected

leader. And I think a lot of us for a long time have thought that the only route is to work really hard, work long

hours, kiss ass, agree with everything that our boss says, agree, you know, play into the workplace politics that

be a people pleaser, like bend to all those things, especially, you know, this happens as the businesses get bigger, as

the businesses start to scale. We think that this is the path and that has been the path for a very long time. This

doesn't work in 2026. Um, you know, the path now is very much how do we get the best the smartest work done, the most

efficient work so that we have time for ourselves. Um, and I' I see leaders still to this day who think that they

build respect through working long hours and kissing ass. And I am here today to tell you it's actually the opposite. So,

hey guys, very quick introduction to me. A lot of you will know me because you've signed up to this webinar. So, very,

very quick one. My name is Heather Elington. started my um leadership journey on the Harage shop floor. So I

got that job 2016. How old was I? 20 21 maybe 21 20 21 years old. I just come out of uni. I did a business management

degree. So I learned all the theory of management, the Kaizen, the Ford production lines. I went to a a really

great business school and learned all of those things. But the f day I stepped forth on that Harold shop floor as an

assistant manager, the first day I had to I remember pulling someone up because they were late to work and I was

terrified. And I remember thinking, where's this in the textbook? Or you know that feeling of imposter syndrome

when someone turns around and says like complicated words and you don't know what they mean and you think, [ __ ] am I

supposed to I'm supposed to know this? I can't tell them that I don't know what it means. And so all those fears really

came to play when I worked at Harrods. And I think at that time I just didn't dare ask. I I didn't have the courage to

ask questions. I just thought I was living a lie. I can't explain it, but I feel like a lot of you will know exactly

what I mean. I felt like I was pretending to be something and someone like really putting up these walls,

these facade walls. Um then throughout the course of the next sort of three to four years, I moved through a few

different roles. So I had like a PA role in a music tech business that I think if anyone I always say this to people who

are really junior in their career maybe just coming out of uni. If you are unsure what you want to do in life and

you just want to kind of learn get experience get knowledge go and work in a PA role for a busy founder in a small

startup company because you will learn so much. So that PA role although I wasn't in a direct management role I

learned so much. I sat really closely with the founder learned about operations finance. so many things and

then eventually moved into a tech startup called Go Proposal. Um and that business I I joined I was a second

member of staff took a bit of a risk with the job as a second member of staff and worked my way through the next three

to four years into the ops director role. So we built that business from the ground up and then we sold it into Sage.

Now, Sage Group, a lot of you will know Sage Group, huge corporate business. And I went from overnight being an ops

director in this very small contained startup where I'd built out systems, recruitment systems, on boarding

systems, marketing systems, every people system that could possibly exist, done it in this very small agile startup, all

of a sudden moving into a business like Sage that is a huge corporate. And a lot of you here today will work for some of

these massive companies. And there are so many pros to work working in huge companies, but it's very different to

startup world. You know, you all of a sudden have just like the red tape. Things move slower. You have more

politics. And I went from this small startup role into this huge corporate role managing five different teams

across the globe very quickly. And I had to learn so fast. And I think that was really the turning point in my career

where I was like, there's no hiding anymore. You have to face who you are. You have to face all these insecurities,

all the things you don't feel the courage about. you have to go and face them. Then back in 2023, so I'd started

having these wins in my leadership role at Sage, just small wins with we used to do these like glint surveys. Some of you

will know exactly what they are and you might wse a little bit, but essentially like engagement surveys where every

single person in the business answered them and every manager would get like scores on how engaged their team were,

how much they were like felt the vision, etc., etc., how much they like the feedback. And my scores twice came up as

the top leadership scores across the entirety of Sage. So across our global team, 13,000 employees. And eventually

the learning and development director reached out to me and said, "Heather, um since you're getting these scores, can

you run some workshops for our it was initially to um aspiring managers, so people who they wanted to put into

leadership roles and just tell them kind of these principles of work and leadership that you're working with."

And so I started to do that and I thought at the same time as delivering these workshops. So they sent me to

Vancouver, they sent me to LA, I went to all these incredible places across the world, teaching these leadership

workshops internally at Sage and I will always shout Sage's name from the rooftop guys because they gave me such

great opportunities. I had the best manager I've ever had in my career there. Shout out to Karen. And I just

yeah just have not no bad words to say about them. Although they're corporate and have the normal corporate, you know,

quams just like everyone just like all big corporates do. and they sent me all across the world teaching these

leadership workshops and at the same time I was like okay if people internally want to hear this maybe

people externally need to hear it too I started posting on Tik Tok eventually those videos went viral and back in 2023

I eventually built up an audience across LinkedIn and Tik Tok I wasn't really doing Instagram then LinkedIn and Tik

Tok and started running workshops externally as well so I founded fresh leadership world in I was about to say

last year but that was year before last now and I have now directly trained thousands thousands and thousands of

managers. I've lost count now and worked with global brands like Sony Music, the Ministry of Defense, Abocrombian Fitch,

um so many AMX. So, it's just my honor to be able to bring this framework directly to you today.

Okay, so here's your four-step matrix. Very first component is mindset. Now, our mind is where everything starts. And

we so often brush over this and we jump straight into the practical stuff, straight into the tools. But how we feel

going into certain situations and how we respond is all determined by the mindset that we hold. So the first thing we have

to do when we become a respected leader is to ensure that our mind is protected. If your if this matrix your leadership

level matrix was the house you live in the mindset is the foundations on which that house is built. Okay? And you all

know if you have weak fragile foundations everything we build on top of it will eventually crumble. When I

first started out in leadership I've mentioned this a little bit. I just had so much imposter syndrome, so much I

guess like a lack of courage. I felt vulnerable around things like my age, my accent, just people pleasing, not being

able to have difficult conversations. And I remember a moment so clearly where I was sat in this um it was a boardroom

in um one of Sage's offices and I remember this moment where I was sat in this boardroom and there was god knows

how many like really high up leaders in there and they were all throwing around very highly technical terms which I know

them all now but things like you know MRR FY25 like all these acronyms that eventually become just embedded into you

but at the time I was like FY what what on earth does that mean? And I remember sitting there thinking, I I dare say

that I don't know because I'm supposed to be this ops director. I'm supposed to know what I'm talking about. And so I'm

sat there thinking, I don't I don't know what to do. I don't know what to do. So eventually I was like, guys, can I just

ask something? What does EOD mean? It wasn't EOD. What does FY whatever mean? And someone kind of laughed and not in a

derogatory way. They were laughing with me and they were like, "We're so sorry, Heather. We do this all the time. we

have all these blooming acronyms and sometimes we, you know, they get so ridiculous we don't even know what they

mean and we forget that people new into the business don't understand them. It means financial year 25 and I was

confused as well because it doesn't line up with calendar year anyway. Apparently that's normal. So um from that moment on

I decided to kind of adopt what I know now as a growth mindset. I came out of that meeting and someone said to me,

"Thank God you asked that because I didn't know either." And there were other people sat in that meeting unsure

what these things meant but just didn't have the courage to ask. And I sort of realized why is it that all of us think

that we have to be perfect. We think we have to give off this air of like perfection and I have all the answers.

And it was from that moment on that I was like okay no longer am I attempting to be anything other than my exact self.

If I don't have the knowledge I'm going to go and ask. I'm going to go and learn. And it created this really solid

foundation for my mind because it meant that if I ever messed up. It just didn't matter because I was never trying to be

perfect in the first place. It meant I could make mistakes. It created such a culture of psychological safety which

eventually led to those um really high feedback scores because my team literally saw that I didn't know

everything either. I was so human. I was so myself. And so this is the action here guys. I want you to focus on

growth, not perfection. How do you let go of this idea of perfection? A really great concept I love is the difference

between perfection and excellence. Okay, perfection avoids criticism. Excellence invites criticism. So, it's not that

we're trying we're not trying to be low standards. That doesn't mean when I say not perfection, what I mean is we want

to be excellent. We want to keep inviting growth, learning, um, criticism, feedback, keep inviting it

inside so that we can just grow and learn and we can become excellent. When you seek growth, you let go of this idea

of being perfect. And instead, you really lean into what growth needs to happen, what learning needs to happen,

what questions need to be asked in order to become this respected leader, to feel respected, to act in a way that, you

know, a team can respect. Ultimately, we become just way less scared of failure. And people see that. People feel that. I

did a video the other day on TikTok about how emotions are contagious. There is literally a psychological concept

called emotional contagion. When you have this sense of imposter syndrome, people can literally feel it and they

take it on too. Like they start to feel like they need to be perfect. So, we have to let go of it. Um, and it really

creates that base of psychological safety in the team. So, for mindset, I'm going to leave you with this.

We trust people. We trust leaders who say, "I don't know." So much more than we trust those who seem to have all the

answers. Okay? If you are the if you are willing to be the manager that puts their hand up and goes, "I'm actually

not sure about that one. Let me get back to you." Or, "Can I ask a question here?" You will become trusted and

therefore so much more of a respected leader when we don't chase this illusion of being perfect because it will

ultimately work against us. We are human. Not knowing the answers is never silly. Perfection is silly because

perfection is completely unattainable for a human being. Perfection is essentially fear. We have to let it go.

Okay. So your action here is seek growth. What questions need to be asked? What walls do we need to bring down so

that others can see we don't care about perfection? Okay. Conflict. Everyone's favorite is conflict. Now, this is one

of the most uncomfortable yet most important parts of leadership, conflict. Most of us avoid conflict like the

plague. We sugarcoat feedback. We dance around difficult conversations. We don't have the conversations. Maybe we write

them down in our notes like, "Oh, I will have this." And then we don't. And when we do, we sugarcoat it so it lands a bit

nicer. I do it, too. I've been there. I still do it today. I still have to snap myself out of this doing this today

because it's natural. We have been taught from a very very young age that niceness is the right way to behave

behave that to be polite, don't rock the boat, make people feel good. And that conditioning really sticks with us. The

problem with that conditioning, guys, is when we move into a leadership role, being nice might win you the short-term

approval, but it will lose you the long-term respect. I'm going to tell you a very quick story um about, and if

you've done some of my workshops before, you may have heard this story, but I'm going to tell you it again.

So when we were going through the sales process of go proposal to Sage, we had to essentially one of the one of the um

ways that a big company decides how much to buy a little company for, like how many millions of pounds to buy this

smaller business for, one of the things they use to determine the value, how many millions is how involved is the

founder? So I wasn't the founder. How involved is the founder? And if the founder is a key dependency, is overly

involved. So the marketing relies on them and the sales rely on them etc. It diminishes the value of the business.

And so when we were going through the sales process with of Go proposal to Sage we had to prove that Go proposal

didn't rely heavily on the founder. And a year before we sold it, it actually did. The founder was very involved in

marketing, in sales, in product development, um our events or everything. He was really heavily

involved. And so we went through this process. I called it Kill the King. I did a 12 month process. It was all a bit

of fun, but it was great where I systemized every part of that business so that we could sell it and it was like

a very systemized business to sell into Sage and it was taken away from the founder. What that meant was when we

went into the sales process, I was the one who had to do a lot of the presenting, had to do a lot of the

standing up and telling the story of the business and how we got from X to Y and answer questions. Now, I was still quite

insecure, I would say, at that point. A bit unsure about my leadership. definitely not comfortable with present

you know not hadn't done any of the posting online and getting used to you know using my voice in certain ways and

so I was terrified so I went into this one presentation where Sage were deciding whether or not to buy the

business and I had to present all these different numbers graphs etc and I had practiced this presentation over and

over and over thinking I have to get this right this is literally tens of millions of pounds this deal and it all

comes down to what I do in this presentation okay so I'm practicing go in there, deliver it in Sage's

boardroom, which is at the top of the Shard, very fancy boardroom overlooking London. Go in there, deliver the

presentation, and I walk out and I'm like, I think I smashed that. I think I did really well. Then James, the

founder, came over to me and he was like, Heather, I need to give you some feedback. And he said, you I need to

give you some feedback. You speak so fast, people in that room are going to struggle. People in that room struggle

to understand what you're saying. I need you to slow down now. If you ask a therapist why you speak so fast, a

therapist will tell you, it's because you have no confidence in your own voice. You think you're boring people.

And so you rush through things because you think, why would anyone, you know, listen to me? Why would anyone take time

out of their day to hear me? Let's just get through it as fast as possible. And the feedback really hit me. It was a

punch in the gut. And I think you know some a side note here guys when you get feedback and it hurts that's usually a

sign of something deeper it's usually a sign of even if you get angry which I did and annoyed and pissed off and you

know you want to embarrass like I felt really embarrassed it's if that hurts you it's usually a sign of actually

there's something here that is truth there's some truth in this if you get feedback and it you kind of like

not sure about that one and it doesn't make you angry sometimes that's when the feedback might not be right anyway I

digress so I had this feedback. I felt a bit embarrassed about it, a bit insecure, a bit unsure. And I um went to

the hotel room that evening and I was like, "Okay, let's try and turn this into a gift. Let's try to turn this into

something positive." So, I started listening to podcasts on how to, you know, improve public speaking, slow down

your voice, etc. I started watching YouTube videos and eventually I went to these like small

presentation training groups whereby I would deliver like a five minute presentation in front of a stand-up

group and all the people in the presentation like picture I don't know if some of you have done it. I would

highly recommend you do if not and you you stand up and you pitch your presentation in front of like a few a

small group of people. They critique it and you all critique one another and it's a very safe like fun environment.

And I started doing these things and then you know just gradually got better. went to a conference and delivered I

remember shout out a sound text went to this conference got trusted with a stage 40 minutes barely anyone showed up um

and I was so nervous I was sat in the toilet before basically crying thinking how do I get out of this I felt really

sick I was like can I pretend I'm ill can I just and I was like no Heather we've got to do it and I still talk

quite fast by the way guys but I've definitely slowed it down a lot it doesn't come from a place of nervousness

now it comes more from a place of I don't know I think our brains do all work quite fast these days

and fast forward to now you know my voice I use it for education online I use it to deliver workshops I use it to

deliver my audio book most of my job now is based on me delivering presentation through the my voice and I just go back

to that moment and I think there is a potential that if I hadn't got that feedback could any of this happened

could I now be living my dream life doing my dream job fulfilling my vision of building a world where everyone loves

the work they Could I be doing it if I hadn't got that feedback and hadn't gone on that really deep growth journey with

finding confidence in my own voice? Who knows? And so I now have all this positive evidence of giving feedback,

being kind, doing the kind thing, not the nice thing. Giving feedback is the kind thing to do and it helps to grow

people. And so in leadership, neness really looks like sugar coating the feedback, not giving the feedback. But

kindness when we flip it on its head just means saying the thing even if it hurts someone's feelings because you

know they need to hear it in order to grow. Okay. And so you if you've followed me for any time you will have

definitely heard me talk about this message before. Stop being nice. Start being kind. Um being nice is essentially

working for making today easier. Being nice is not hurting people's feelings. We want

people to feel good in the moment. We want people to like us. Being kind, on the other hand, is having the courage to

give clear, direct feedback even when it's uncomfortable because you care about that person's growth. And that

really is what leadership is all about. That will win you the respect more than anything else because they know the

person on the other end even if it really hurts them really hurts them. They feel a little bit embarrassed, they

feel a little bit scared, they feel a little bit unsure, the respect is when it's done in a kind way. The respect is

still built because you care about their growth. So my challenge to you here, my action I guess is the next time you're

tempted to stay quiet. There is definitely a conversation that every single one of you right now is avoiding.

There's at least one. Just go and have that conversation. Practice having it. It's a muscle just like any other. It's

uncomfortable in the moment, but in the long run, committing to being the leader that is willing to have these

uncomfortable conversations. I am so convinced, guys. So so so convinced our life will literally change. Never mind

leadership, never mind our career or life. If we become the person who is willing to have the conversations that

no one else is willing to have, whether it's with your partner, your friends, your family, people at work, all of us

are just like doing this dance of life, dancing around the truth, dancing around how we really feel. And I know it's

uncomfortable. I know it's awkward to say these things out loud, but say them. Um, I've got so many things I could tell

you about difficult conversations I've had to have in the past. One of the worst conversations I've ever had to

have um hardest hardest is telling someone they had bad body odor. Still to this day, that was the hardest thing

I've ever had to do. Um I felt scared. I felt like I was going to hurt them or, you know, hurt them in a way that wasn't

helpful, wasn't kind. I delivered the feedback. I just took them into the kitchen, delivered it really quick,

really simply. I need to give you some feedback. Um I've noticed body odor. I'm not sure where it's coming from, but I

really need to tell you. Um, and that person actually had a he was about to become a manager and so his new team

member was starting within like a few days and I was like, I need to get on top of this problem because it's gonna

essentially undermine him in front of his team. And so yeah, so I gave the feedback and he came back literally the

next day, literally day one after and said, "Heather, thank you for giving me that feedback. Me and my partner have

realized that we've been it was something to do with the way they were drying their clothes. We've changed it."

And I was like, "Amazing. It was sorted. It was fixed so easy. It was so hard for both of us, but it was fixed.

Okay, are you still with me? Um, just drop me a yes in the comments if you're still with me. Some of you may, if

you've moved over to your emails already, then I'm hoping to get you back. Come on. Yes. Still with me. Okay,

beautiful. Brilliant. Brilliant. Brilliant. Okay, prioritization. This is where

stuff can get a little bit fun. I I posted on my Instagram story today that I truly believe one of the one of my

biggest unfair advantages in life is I am just obsessed with learning and I almost become like a sponge watching

other people. Um especially when I was at Sage, you know, I got the opportunity to be around literally a Footsie 100

CEO, Steve Hair, who's still the CEO of Sage. Awesome leader. I think he he was actually voted top on glass door as the

throughout COVID as like the most respected CEO by his team and I got to live through that. I got to like see it

and be there through it and so it was just yeah it was awesome to watch. brilliant guy and I got to be around him

and I just thought I'm gonna soak everything that he does, his way of interacting with us and you know how he

communicates in all hands all this stuff and multi-million pound business owners you know founders I just soak it all up

and prioritization there is no magic fix there's no like diary journal method um calendar

blocking time anything that is going to fix prioritization for you okay there's no magic fix the fi the way you

prioritize guys, like the top 1%. The way you really get yourself into that leadership like brilliant, respected

is saying no. Right now, so many of us are far too stuck prioritizing completely the wrong things in order to

move forward. We fill our days with, and again, I'm not perfect with any of this, guys. I do this pointless tasks. We say

yes to meetings that we don't need to be in. We schedule meetings that we don't actually need. We make them longer. We

make them an hour when they could be 15 minutes. We volunteer for projects like you know oh I'll be involved in this

approvals um we don't delegate all of this is you know we try to prioritize forgetting that actually we've taken on

all these things that we didn't need to in the first place and we are psychologically conditioned to be people

pleasers. It all comes back to people pleasing. You know it was once the difference between belonging to a tribe

or being eaten by a bear. And so every single thing inside of us wants to go to every meeting, respond to every email

really quickly. It makes us this good AAR student who wears the well done up uniform and gets the tick on their

report card. Even though in the 21st century there are far too many distractions in this day and age, email,

Slack, Teams, WhatsApp, calendar notifications, got endless notifications, Instagram, blah blah

blah. Far too many notifications for us to say yes and be in everything. And saying yes, saying yes to all of it,

whether it's like the speed of it or the, you know, yes to adding more things in or doing it faster, all of that will

win you the short-term respect. Short-term approval, not respect. It'll win you the short-term approval. You'll

get that tick of dopamine that the people pleaser in us wants. And it'll, you know, say, "Oh, we've made this

person happy. We get the A star." The problem with short-term approval is it kills long-term respect. short-term

approval and long-term respect cannot exist there. It's a scale. You're on one side or on the other. You're either on

the short-term approval side where you're saying yes to everything. You're doing the urgent tasks. You're

responding to emails quick, fast, every notification, every email, every everything.

You will over time degrade the respects that people have for you because you can't prioritize what truly matters to

you, to the business, to your health, physical, mental health, um to how smart I guess you can be. And if you really

want to be a leader that people truly respect, you have to stop chasing that approval. If you look at the top 1% of

leaders, the ones we truly admire, they are not trying to please everyone. They know that their time is their most

valuable resource. They are ruthless with it. They decline meetings that add no value. They do not take on tasks or

approvals just to look busy. Um I think we just say yes to way too much because we think it makes us look good in the

moment. But this is what if you imagine this, I'll give you a really real example. Um you're on a call talking

about like a new project and there's all these actions being assigned and you're like yes, I'll be in this one. I will

join this meeting. I'll be in this thing. Right? So it makes you look really good in that moment or you say

yes to the meeting in the first place. It makes you look good. You get that quick hit of approval. Everyone likes

you in that moment. Okay, we win for a little while. Fast forward two weeks, two months and you've all these big

priorities. So, go and, you know, create a new process for how we on board our clients or um, you know, spend go and

see this client and spend some time with them or have these one-on- ones with your team or, you know, look into the

team processes. How do we level up personal development? All the stuff that actually makes us, the business, our

team win in the long run has to take a backseat because you are now working on these shortterm task quick tick

priorities. Okay? And so what really builds that respect over time when it comes to prioritization is saying no.

It's it sounds so simple. I know it isn't. It's so much easier said than done. Um but the leaders who really

stand out and win that respect really are the ones saying no. So my challenge to you here is very simple. We're on

Wednesday or Thursday if you're in New Zealand. We're on Wednesday. I want you to go through your calendar for the rest

of this week and for next week and I want you to see how many meetings you can either delegate, cancel all

together, or shorten is the final option. Ideally, get yourself out of or just shorten. So, I I think a really

good hack for this is like I quite often will put all my meetings on one day. So, try my best to get everything in one day

and try to keep it short and snappy. So if a team member needs me for something, obviously I want to give them my time. I

want to help them, but I'm like, we can do it in 20 minutes. We don't need an hour. And in that, it helps you to then

eventually become just better with time, like more structured with your time. Even one even one cancellation would be

a win. And finally, accountability. I feel like accountability is one of the most misunderstood concepts in

leadership. It feels like one of the most complex because we're essentially trying to get people to care about

something and it requires lots of kind of complex questioning system psychology which I'm

not going to be able to go into all of it today, but I'm going to give you an overview of what I think accountability

is and really help you to see it in a way that should get you to move forward with it. So before we do anything, the

best way I have ever seen accountability or the or lack thereof explained is using a concept called above the line

thinking. This concept has existed in business in management for decades and decades now every single day in our team

and we as managers face face a choice. We face a choice and our team face a choice. Are we going to operate above

the line, owning what we can control, finding solutions, being accountable, or are we going to go below the line, blame

others, make excuses, you know, it was the team, it was a different team, it was a client, it was the economy, it was

the weather. And before we even begin to consider how to get our team to be accountable, to KPIs, to care, to be

engaged, I need you to just take a second to think, do you I don't want you to think about your team here. Do you

dayto-day sit above or below the line? If something goes wrong, what do you do? Where do you fall? Because if you don't

fall above that line, I hate to break it to you, you've got almost no chance of getting your team to. So, you first have

to become an accountable human being. Then we can start and I would actually encourage you to share this with your

team. Share this concept. If you Google above the line thinking, you can find it's you know this is not mine. It's

existed for decades in different management theory etc. And so Google it. Show your team this concept. Show them

this because even just becoming aware of it helps us to stop and go, "Oh yeah, I do sit there." Now, let's look at a

little bit. I'm going to quickly drill through how both you and your team can move above this line if you're operating

below it. Okay? Let's look at you first because accountability in you has to come first. Always do what you say

you're going to do. So simple. So many people and you will either be this person but I'm going to get bet that

there's other people that you know that are like this. They'll go, "Oh yeah, I'll send it to you by Friday. Oh, I'll

I'll let you know in a couple of hours and then they don't." Do you know how many knocks of respect that knocks off

you? Because people don't forget. You think, "Oh, they won't remember that I said I'll send it to him in a couple of

hours." They remember. We all remember. And they're sat there thinking, "Are they going to send it?" They never sent

that thing. And it just knocks down that rung of respect. So always do what you say you're going to do. I think this

actually comes from just getting really organized. Like just get really organized with your tasks, your to-do

list, and don't overcommit. So, when you're about to send that message to someone to say, "I'll get it to you in a

couple of hours. I'll get it to you by the end of the week." Think, is that actually doable? Can I do that? Because

if not, let's not commit to it. Let's extend the timeline a little bit. Reduce the scope. Whatever you need to do. But

your word is sacred as a leader. Okay? Your word is going to be what people remember you by. they're going to

remember if you sorry if you committed to that word or not. Next, this is a line that I think when we move into a

management role, we have to repeat over and over and over and over again. It may not be our fault,

but it is our problem. Now, we are in a management role. We, I am sorry to report, lose the luxury of blame. We

just lose it. We can have things as reasons. There may be external reasons. There's a difference between a reason

and an excuse. Okay, a reason is saying and they can be the same sentence, but it depends what you do with it next. So

the reason might be the economy. The reason might be a different team. The reason might be a client.

But how we turn that from an excuse because that would be the excuse to a reason is to say, "And here's what I'm

going to do about it." Okay? here's why we're here, but I'm going to tell you now how I'm going to move us back above

that line because yes, this shitty thing has happened, but it's my my problem now to figure out how we move forward.

And lastly, go and seek feedback. I think there is no greater leader than the one who is consistently committed to

asking their team for feedback and actioning actioning it and actually putting it into place. You know, we

talked about those management surveys, glint surveys. There's nothing worse than when a business does that and

doesn't action it. You have to action those things and show your team. Communicate to them, I've got this

feedback. Thank you for this feedback. Feedback is a gift. I'm taking it on and I'm going to action it. There is nothing

worse than when a manager gets feedback and they just deflect um blame. Aren't willing to take it on. It's okay. We

don't have to take on all feedback. Sometimes feedback isn't right. But give yourself a little time to sit in it and

actually ask yourself, could this be something I'm really insecure about and therefore I'm trying to, you know, bat

it off. So seek feedback and action it. This is how you get yourself back above the line. Now let's talk about

accountability in your team. Now I have workshops on this that span hours and hours because accountability is such a

deep concept. So I've really tried to distill it into as simple simple as possible. Firstly, your team cannot own

what they don't understand. If every member of your team does not have a really simple three to five success

measures, success measures that they know exactly what they are accountable for, then we've already lost. They have

to be so so super clear. This is yours to own. I'm giving you full accountability of it. You take it. Have

fun with it. You know, go and experiment with it. Tell me how you're trying new things. It has to be clear because if

they're just accountable for everything, things are going to get lost. it's going to get hard. Now, have a regular

follow-up, a rhythm. A rhythm, that's probably the most important part there as opposed to the follow-up. Have a

cadence of meetings. And I know we've talked about meetings being pointless, most of them, but the meetings that

aren't pointless are the ones that are really intentional with tracking and reporting. Now there's a concept in

accountability that I think this could be a golden nugget for you which is when we have reporting meetings in any

sort any kind whether it's like a weekly trading meeting a standup a you know a monthly review meeting where you talk

about data with your team the team have to bring the data you as a manager should not be the person pulling the

data into the spreadsheet showing it to the team and then going explain this the team report into you that's what it

means they report into you. Therefore, they have to bring that data and report on it. They will learn so much by

finding out where that data comes from, looking at all the small caveats and reasons why, you know, it's not above

this number and it is below this number. They have to report into you. You then have to ask the questions in that

session really clearly. You know, what's the data? These are my three questions for accountability. What's the data?

What's the reason? And then what are we doing about it? So those three what's the data? Just give me the numbers.

What's the reason? So why are we there? This is where we can have a little bit of blame, a bit of reasoning. Why are we

there? What's happened this month? That means that number is there. Next, what are we doing about it? It gives no one

the opportunity to get out scot-free without giving us reasons why every I have this session now with my team every

week. They come to the session every single week with this is what I'm doing about it. And what the good thing about

this is what I'm doing about it is if you've done really well, so we smashed a target last week. We got the highest

number of Substack um signups we've had in forever. I think it was our highest week ever. And the what so what are we

doing about it question is how do we do this more? Do you know what I mean? Like what are we doing to make sure this

happens again and again? And so it's not always negative, but that's where the accountability really lies. And it's got

to be in a rhythm. Outside of that rhythm, you've got to leave them alone. You can't be checking in. You've got to

almost like hold your hand up and if you see something potentially failing, you kind of have to let it happen. you have

to let them run over a deadline. Um, and then you bring it up to say, "I thought we had this really clear. Can we just

talk about, you know, what wasn't clear?" And then lastly, reward ownership, not perfection. This is just

a concept in um, accountability that I find really powerful. If all you ever do is praise people for hitting targets,

you you're kind of missing out on the big chunk like the 95% of really great work that they're doing. So start to

reward things like and when I say reward, reward is just praise. It can come in praise. It can come in like

actual fun awards. Reward effort and experimentation and learning and growth and trying and trying new things, not

just the we've hit the target so everyone gets a reward. There has to be some sort of reward and praise for that

ownership too. I told you it was fast. Um but okay if I truly believe if you can begin to master

these concepts and not even master just take small steps towards these four. So, we've got a mindset, growth, not

perfection. Focus on growth. Focus on never wanting to be the perfect person. Just wanting to learn, grow, and lean

into more learning. Conflict, having the difficult conversations, being honest. It will get you so far. Prioritization.

Say no. Say no more or reduce the scope. Get really good at figuring out what's urgent and what's important. emails,

notifications, meetings, urgent project. Um, you know, creativity, innovation, systems, processes, important, learning,

personal development, important. Get really good at saying no to the urgent and yes to the important. And then

accountability just I mean I won't recap all those points we went through but I think if I was to give you one pointer

to take away from that accountability part show your team the above below the line thinking and just regularly like me

and Levi now make jokes um when something goes wrong and we really want to blame and we're like oh this

we're like stay above the line stay above the line you know we can we make fun of it it's fun now. Um so show your

team that concept. to get them used to understanding when we fall into blame and how harmful that can really be.

Okay, now this is where we get to the sales part of this session. So, if you don't like being sold to, clock out for

three minutes. But if you want to hear what I've got to sell to you, um it's something that we're really proud of. If

you want to just be nosing and see what it's about, then I'm going to show you something that I literally built to

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Take a quick look inside. So, enrollment begins on the 17th of Feb. If you've got a little bit of time to get sign off

from the company, this is right, we're right at the beginning of the campaign period. Week one, so it's six weeks and

we have loads of stuff happening. We have action track. It's not just learning online. You are live with me.

You have sessions with me live, some of them pre-recorded, some live Q&As's. We have a Slack channel where we all come

together as a community to like talk about our problems. Um, help each other solve them because you will learn so

much more from other managers across the globe than you will with me. Week one, we snap you into that bulletproof

leader, lead leadership mindset, imposter syndrome, managing up, all the psychology behind what we need to do,

like fear, what we need to do to get oursel feeling ready to be a leader. What do great managers do all day? This

is where we get operationally deep. So, we look into systems, um, one-on-one, so much more around like the operations and

systems that a manager requires to be a great leader, tracking KPIs and actually getting your team to hit them.

Potentially, my favorite module, the depth around accountability. So like I said, all of that um you know psychology

around accountability, all of the I guess how it says it in the title exactly how we get our team to hit KPIs,

how we create KPIs. We have like a seven deadly sins of KPIs and then how exactly we map that into KPIs being incredible

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hardest part of leadership and then finally own it on your own from here. So week six is just very empowering. Um it

is very yeah it's just essentially me helping you to now have the confidence and the power to really take it on your

own from here. The transformations have been huge. I just took this screenshot today from our website because these

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many more than this. There's I think there's like 50 different testimonials now from people who've taken this. And

so go inside the link on our website, you'll be able to see testimonials from different managers across the globe who

have joined us. We've had so many incredible transformations. There may even be some people in here who have

joined us before. Um so yeah, it's CPD accredited. We have a community, meetups, Q&A. So you will now have the

link in your inbox. Join the weight list. That's all. It's just one step to join that weight list. We're going to do

a Q&A after this, by the way, guys. just one step to join that weight list. Join us. We have 150 spaces available. So, we

don't open up this up to everyone. We only bring 150 people in to make sure that it is we can support everyone. We

can answer everyone's questions and we get everyone as much time as they need. Here's the cost in. We'll get it in your

inbox. So, it's 875 early bird. This goes up if you So, we don't open till the 17th of Feb. So, all you need to do

right now is get on the wait list and you'll get all this information or you can do um monthly installments. That

should say two monthly payments, not three. Okay, thank you for bearing with me while we did that. If you are still

here, I'm very, very grateful to you. Now, this time is for you. So, any questions? Oh my god, there's already

34, right? I think what I'm going to have to do, normally I'm like I try and answer every

question. The fact we're already at 35 is going to be a struggle. So, what I'm going to do is

go through as many as I can. Um, and then afterwards, I will respond to you all on email. Oh my god, look how shiny

I am, guys. I'm in Bangkok. I've just seen my face. I'm not actually see what I look like. I'm in Bangkok and it is I

don't even know. It was 32 degrees earlier. We do have air, but I'm also really warm. I'm going to stop going

through these questions. Um, but if Thanks, Anna. I appreciate you. We'll go with glow. It's highlighter. And someone

else has said, "Can we have the slides for the webinar?" Yes, you'll get the recording. Um I don't think you get the

slides, but I'm happy to send them to you. I'll ask Levi to put them in the um thingy so you can screenshot them

because Yeah. All good. Okay. Right. I Okay, I'm going to start answering. I'm just going to go I'm just

going to jump in. I'm just going to jump into the Q&A and see where we get to. But I apologize. I normally love to get

to everyone's questions, but I'm not going to be able to right now. So, hey Carolina, I'm new at the company

I work at. I've been working here for two months, and by the time I accomplished my first month, my boss was

fired and I was asked to fill in his position. So, now I'm learning how to be the first position and the manager of

the business unit and I'm alone because the other person who was supposed to work in my team was fired. How can I

manage both positions temporarily? Basically, how can I prioritize between client diligent and management tasks? If

there was one part of this session, Carolina, that you need to get really good at, it was the prioritization one.

Don't be afraid. I think when we start anywhere new, the people pleasing is the harshest. Like the people pleasing shows

up the most because it's new people. We want to show our best, do our best. I would say, and by the way, guys, I think

you can I don't know if other people can answer the qu. Never mind. So, get really good at saying no. Something you

have to realize is when you say no, it doesn't lose you respect, it earns you respect. So get really good at saying

no. I think the company if they're any sort of decent company will be very understanding of you saying look and and

this is what we want in a leader as well saying look I've taken on two roles. I'm really happy to do it. I'm excited for

this opportunity. I want to absolutely smash it out the park but I need you to I need you to just respect that when I

say no to things. I'm doing it with the business and the company wi with that in my heart at the best what am I trying to

say in the best interest of the company essentially um and make it really clear that you're going to have to get so

diligent with prioritization and whoever is above you watching you someone has done that someone has when that person's

got fired they have put you in that position because they've already seen how great you are they've they wouldn't

have put you there if they didn't think you could do it and so they've already seen how great you are it's just going

to be a case of really diligent prioritization. Now, don't be afraid to say no. Okay.

How can you lead in a position where you have the responsibility for topics but higher management takes over decision-m?

Yeah, this is a difficult one. It happens a lot in bigger businesses. Um, so you have responsibility, I guess,

within your team for certain things, but there's a lot of like decision- making that happens above you that maybe you

don't have the um I guess like you don't have the seniority to change. I think this all comes down to communication.

So, how you communicate it with your team. What I always say when change happens above, so something happens

above, a decision's made that you don't necessarily agree with, it's okay. We don't have to, you know, pretend we love

it. What we have to do is be very transparent and honest to both parties. So, what I mean by that is, let's say

something, a big decision that people come to me with all the time and ask for my advice on is my company has just, you

know, increased the working office days that we have and my team don't like it and I don't like it either, but I can't

do anything about it. What am I supposed to do with the team? Am I supposed to say I agree with it, you know, in the

interest of the company or am I on my team's side? So what I say to it is this. Pick a side. Pick a side as in do

you disagree with this thing or do you agree with it? If you disagree with it, that's fine. You can kind of explain to

your team. I know this is not this doesn't feel like it's been done in your best interest. Let me go and make the

case to management and then make sure that you actually back them in front of senior management. The worst thing that

a manager can do in that situation is kiss ass in front of seniors and then go to their team and be like, "Oh, it's so

annoying. I hate this. it's really bad decision. Pick a side and stick with that side. It's okay if you disagree.

It's okay if you really agree, but you have to pick a side. You can't be going to both and flip-flopping. I honestly

think one of the most important leadership traits for 2026 and for this kind of new era of leadership that we're

in now is transparency. I think we went through empathy. Empathy really came about I think when we sort of hit 2015

and the workplace started to we just started to like allow ourselves to create more emotional bonds within the

workplace. We had more women in leadership roles and business really started to empathy became really

important and it was something that hadn't really existed in the workplace before. you know, it was very

bureaucratic, um, very like top- down decision-m and then empathy became a thing and I think we've seen that for

the last 10 years really make a stamp on the workplace. I now think we've moved out of that. Not that it's disappeared.

We've just evolved. We've moved on from it in in a better way in that no longer is it about, you know, understanding

every one of your team's problems. It's now about transparency. Transparency is the new era of leadership that I think

we're going into because what we have to realize now is everyone has so much information at their fingertips. The the

brand new employee who is, you know, fresh out of school, 17 years old, can Google and find out how much your

business is making, how much your CEO is taking. Um, they can look at the company accounts on company's house if you're in

the UK. I'm sure you can do it in other countries, too. Um, and so all of this information exists. They can ask Chat

GBC anything they want. They can learn anything they want to. And so now I think it's the company and the managers

the the thing that's going to really separate them from the rest is no longer the empathy but actually the

transparency to say I respect your intelligence. I know how much information intelligent and intelligence

you have and I'm going to respect it by being transparent and therefore when these decisions are made just going back

to your question Lisa when these decisions are made um we are able to say to our team look this is how we made it

this is why we made it this is when we made it we got your feedback um this is what if you're making it for the company

for cash in the bank that's okay tell people be so transparent with people and this is really where I think and hope

we're going to see a change in decision-m from senior leadership over the next I think like 5 to 10 years. I

really hope so anyway, but pick a side. Um, okay. I'm really interested to know how to better manage my situation. Okay.

Where I'm transitioning from being a strong senior individual contributor to a people manager who is still required

to be an individual contributor at times. Yeah, I think we've all been here. It is darn confusing at times and

doesn't make it easy to manage my team who likely still view me as a contributor who should also be doing the

work. Yeah. My goal for 2026 is to create more space to think strategically and drive more impact would appreciate

tips. I do you know what I would do if you're in this situation and it it may be just that you've just made the

transition into being a manager or this happens with man you know we find ourselves in these positions whether

it's like a a new team we've taken on a new team member. I don't think this has a time span. I think even if we've been

in leadership roles for 10 years, we can find ourselves in these situations. What I would do is create yourself, this is

how I work really well. Create yourself like a threemonth um accountability plan to say, okay,

this time in three months, here's what I want my calendars to look like. Here's what I want to feel like. Here's how I

want to show up. I want to be given this feedback. I want to be, you know, doing X, Y, and Zed. And then break it down

into the steps. So every week it's like, okay, this week I'm going to remove two recurring meetings. This week I'm going

to commit to having whatever feedback conversations and do it in a very like strategic planned way. This week, I

think delegating is a big part of this. This week I'm going to delegate. Um, write down a list list of the tasks and

every week delegate one task. After three months, that's 12 weeks. 12 things are off your plate. And all of a sudden,

you start freeing up the time to be this strategic leader and all of this stuff. I think we get it confused in

leadership. We think that by doing more, being more, taking more on, doing the tasks, doing the doing, we think that's

what's going to gain us the respect from our team. It's not. It's the opposite. If you if our team see us, this is where

it really is a paradox. Like, if our team see us kissing ass, working long hours, working on holiday, you know, not

taking a lunch break, do you think that builds respect? Do you think they look at us and go, "Oh, I really, you know, I