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The Ultimate Leadership Playbook: CEOs Share Their Top Tips for Leading by Example · Leading By Example: Executives Making An Impact

• 0:03
  Speaker 1: Ruby crisises are going to happen. The question is, and
• 0:09
  Speaker 1: the moment of truth is can you overcome them or not?
• 0:13
  Speaker 2: I don't have all the answers. That's why you're here
• 0:15
  Speaker 2: and I need your help.
• 0:17
  Speaker 3: You entrust in drops and you lose it by the buckets.
• 0:21
  Speaker 4: You have to know your blast radius.
• 0:23
  Speaker 5: A failure only defines you if you let it.
• 0:29
  Speaker 2: Hi.
• 0:30
  Speaker 6: Everyone, I'm Jessica chen Emmy Award winning journalist, founder of
• 0:33
  Speaker 6: Soulcast Media, a communications training company, an author of the
• 0:37
  Speaker 6: book Smart Not Loud, How to get noticed at work
• 0:40
  Speaker 6: for all the right reasons. And this is leading by example.
• 0:44
  Speaker 6: So normally this is the part where I tell you
• 0:47
  Speaker 6: who today's guest is, but not today because today is
• 0:52
  Speaker 6: our season finale, and instead of one conversation, we're going
• 0:57
  Speaker 6: back through every episode of the season and the moments
• 1:00
  Speaker 6: that made us stop, rewind and listen again. So this
• 1:05
  Speaker 6: season we sat down with nine incredible leaders, and what
• 1:09
  Speaker 6: really struck me going back through all of it is that,
• 1:12
  Speaker 6: even though these are nine completely different careers, the same
• 1:17
  Speaker 6: handful of truths kept showing up. So instead of handing
• 1:21
  Speaker 6: you a highlight reel, we organized this season into something
• 1:25
  Speaker 6: you can actually use a four part leadership playbook. So
• 1:29
  Speaker 6: here's your roadmap for the next half hour. First, it's
• 1:32
  Speaker 6: all about leading yourself. You'll hear from Shelley Arschambau, former
• 1:36
  Speaker 6: tech CEO and author of Unapologetically Ambitious, and Anya Smith,
• 1:40
  Speaker 6: CEO of task Wrapit on building your own resilience and
• 1:44
  Speaker 6: confidence before you lead anyone else. Then we'll dive into
• 1:49
  Speaker 6: leading your people. There we'll hear from Grace Lee Chen,
• 1:53
  Speaker 6: co founder of Bertie Gray, Vanessa Do, former CEO of
• 1:57
  Speaker 6: Healthy Kombucha, and raj Say Shadri, chief Commercial Payments officer
• 2:02
  Speaker 6: at MasterCard, on delegation and trust. Next, we'll learn how
• 2:07
  Speaker 6: to lead through change with Joel Koher, CEO of Human
• 2:12
  Speaker 6: and Jessica Jensen, chief marketing officer at LinkedIn on staying
• 2:16
  Speaker 6: grounded despite the world changing so fast. And lastly will
• 2:21
  Speaker 6: close on leading with purpose and here from Meredith Seacrest Leech,
• 2:25
  Speaker 6: CEO of the Ryan Seacrest Foundation and Ben Walter, CEO
• 2:30
  Speaker 6: of JP Morgan Workplace Solutions on connecting with the why
• 2:34
  Speaker 6: behind your work and knowing how powerful your words can be.
• 2:40
  Speaker 6: I'm Jessica Chen, and this is leading by example. So
• 2:46
  Speaker 6: let's start with chapter one leading yourself. We'll hear two
• 2:51
  Speaker 6: very different versions of that lesson, one from a leader
• 2:54
  Speaker 6: who suffered a major setback while on the top of
• 2:57
  Speaker 6: her game, and another who chose to want away from
• 3:00
  Speaker 6: her career without knowing what the other side would hold.
• 3:04
  Speaker 6: We'll start with Shelley Archambeau, former tech CEO and the
• 3:07
  Speaker 6: author of Unapologetically Ambitious Everything in her sales job was
• 3:12
  Speaker 6: going great until it wasn't.
• 3:16
  Speaker 5: I did have one loss that literally felt like, Oh
• 3:20
  Speaker 5: my gosh. My career's over Right Aid Corporation. They were
• 3:23
  Speaker 5: my client at the time. I'd been selling for eighteen
• 3:26
  Speaker 5: months trying to get IBM point of sale equipment and
• 3:30
  Speaker 5: all their stores. We won the deal. This was like
• 3:33
  Speaker 5: tens of millions of dollars multi year. My boss was
• 3:37
  Speaker 5: a hero, His boss was a hero. It was all
• 3:40
  Speaker 5: great until the CEO calls me into his office.
• 3:45
  Speaker 6: They're canceling three days after the deal collapsed, and her
• 3:50
  Speaker 6: late husband asked how her day was.
• 3:53
  Speaker 5: Oh my gosh, it was like somebody had literally died. Oh, Shelley,
• 3:58
  Speaker 5: I heard right, would say, Oh yeah, they're whispering. I'm
• 4:01
  Speaker 5: getting calls. Everybody wants lost reviews at all the levels
• 4:05
  Speaker 5: and then what this and that. I come home from
• 4:07
  Speaker 5: work three days after all this happened, and my late
• 4:09
  Speaker 5: husband says to me, so, how was your day? And
• 4:11
  Speaker 5: I'm like, how do you think my day was? And
• 4:13
  Speaker 5: he looks at me and he says, Shelley, the morning
• 4:16
  Speaker 5: period is over. He said, you are the same person
• 4:19
  Speaker 5: you were four days ago before you got this news.
• 4:22
  Speaker 5: This doesn't define you. Go find something else to sell.
• 4:26
  Speaker 5: And you know what, he was right. It was the
• 4:28
  Speaker 5: kick in the pants that I needed to realize that
• 4:31
  Speaker 5: a failure only defines you if you let it.
• 4:38
  Speaker 6: I have to tell you. When Shelley shared this story
• 4:41
  Speaker 6: with us, I actually got a little emotional because I
• 4:45
  Speaker 6: imagine for many of us, you might have had a
• 4:48
  Speaker 6: big deal, a big project, or that promotion you were
• 4:52
  Speaker 6: running for that just totally fell apart after months of
• 4:56
  Speaker 6: hard work. And what I love about her husband's line,
• 5:01
  Speaker 6: the morning period is over, is that it gives you
• 5:04
  Speaker 6: permission to, yes, feel the loss, but not stay dwelling
• 5:09
  Speaker 6: in your disappointment. You get a couple of days, sure,
• 5:13
  Speaker 6: but disappointment and failure isn't a reflection on you and
• 5:17
  Speaker 6: your abilities. That distinction is to me, the entire difference
• 5:23
  Speaker 6: between a loss and a comeback story you can tell
• 5:27
  Speaker 6: for the rest of your life. Our next guest also
• 5:30
  Speaker 6: reconnected with herself in order to level up her career.
• 5:34
  Speaker 6: Anya Smith is now the CEO of task Rabbit, the
• 5:38
  Speaker 6: online platform that links people with taskers who can do
• 5:42
  Speaker 6: everything from shoveling a driveway to mounting a TV. But
• 5:46
  Speaker 6: before any of that, she made a decision most ambitious
• 5:50
  Speaker 6: people would never think of doing, packing up her family
• 5:53
  Speaker 6: and leaving her career behind for a year in Argentina
• 5:58
  Speaker 6: with no real plan or what came next. Here's Anya
• 6:02
  Speaker 6: picking up right after they landed.
• 6:06
  Speaker 7: You know, I remember it was pouring outside. We had
• 6:08
  Speaker 7: ten big suitcases, our airbnb was not ready, and it
• 6:12
  Speaker 7: was dark and cold, and I thought, oh my gosh,
• 6:16
  Speaker 7: what did we do? Like, why did I leave this
• 6:18
  Speaker 7: really amazing life that I had.
• 6:21
  Speaker 6: That's the doubt. And here's what she said when I
• 6:24
  Speaker 6: asked her how it actually turned out.
• 6:27
  Speaker 7: It made me accelerate in my career. I came back
• 6:31
  Speaker 7: more confident in who I am and what I wanted
• 6:34
  Speaker 7: to do, what I didn't want to do, and I
• 6:37
  Speaker 7: was able to find work quite quickly. Working in uncertainty
• 6:42
  Speaker 7: is something that I have to do now every day,
• 6:44
  Speaker 7: and that is definitely very similar in some sense being
• 6:48
  Speaker 7: dropped off in the middle of Buenos Aires without speaking
• 6:52
  Speaker 7: the language for the first time in my life. I
• 6:55
  Speaker 7: felt extremely content with the choices that we've made because
• 6:59
  Speaker 7: we had a year to decide to do something else,
• 7:02
  Speaker 7: and we didn't really taking the time to take a
• 7:05
  Speaker 7: step back and think about what we want out of life,
• 7:08
  Speaker 7: what do we want for our family, for our careers.
• 7:11
  Speaker 7: And having that gift and that break was amazing and
• 7:14
  Speaker 7: it was definitely worth every minute.
• 7:20
  Speaker 6: And what I love about this moment is Anya's story
• 7:23
  Speaker 6: isn't about her taking a sabbatical. No, it's about giving
• 7:27
  Speaker 6: yourself the space to stop and ask what do I
• 7:31
  Speaker 6: actually want instead of what's next? And for Anya, she
• 7:37
  Speaker 6: didn't just come back. She came back as the CEO
• 7:40
  Speaker 6: of Task Rabbit. And in my opinion, having that clarity
• 7:45
  Speaker 6: can give you that self assured confidence to help you
• 7:50
  Speaker 6: unlock doors that maybe you wouldn't have had before. But
• 7:54
  Speaker 6: what happens once people are counting on you? That's chapter two,
• 8:00
  Speaker 6: Leading your people. I believe the next test of leadership
• 8:06
  Speaker 6: is what happens when you're now responsible for other people
• 8:10
  Speaker 6: when you have to delegate, build trust, and sometimes admit
• 8:15
  Speaker 6: you don't have all the answers. In this chapter, you'll
• 8:18
  Speaker 6: hear from three leaders. Grace Lee Chen, co founder of
• 8:22
  Speaker 6: Bertie Gray, on knowing when to step back, Vanessa du
• 8:26
  Speaker 6: co founder of Healthy Kombucha, on what to do when
• 8:30
  Speaker 6: your metrics and your team's morale stop matching up. And
• 8:34
  Speaker 6: Raj Seshadri, chief Commercial Payments Officer at MasterCard, on how
• 8:39
  Speaker 6: to build trust with your team. Let's start with Grace.
• 8:43
  Speaker 6: Her company, Bertie Gray, makes bridesmaid dresses more affordable and accessible. Now.
• 8:49
  Speaker 6: Most founders, when they hit a huge revenue milestone, they
• 8:53
  Speaker 6: double down and hold on tighter. But Grace she did
• 8:57
  Speaker 6: the opposite.
• 9:00
  Speaker 8: I have been in the weeds for a really long time,
• 9:02
  Speaker 8: and I felt like it was time for me to
• 9:05
  Speaker 8: really prioritize family planning and personal things professionally. The business
• 9:10
  Speaker 8: was booming. We hit a really big milestone last year.
• 9:13
  Speaker 8: We had one hundred million in revenue, and I was like, okay,
• 9:16
  Speaker 8: I got us here. It is now time to pass
• 9:18
  Speaker 8: off the reins to an experience CEO to unlock the
• 9:21
  Speaker 8: next piece of growth.
• 9:24
  Speaker 6: So I love this insight from Grace because she was
• 9:27
  Speaker 6: so clear eyed about what she needed to do next.
• 9:31
  Speaker 6: She stepped back from the CEO seat into chief creative
• 9:35
  Speaker 6: officer because she knew exactly where she added the most
• 9:40
  Speaker 6: value and she was honest about where she didn't. Because
• 9:45
  Speaker 6: right now, I think a lot of us confuse stepping
• 9:47
  Speaker 6: back with giving up. But Grace's story is proof that
• 9:52
  Speaker 6: sometimes the most strategic thing you can do for your
• 9:55
  Speaker 6: people as a leader is identifying your own ceiling and
• 10:00
  Speaker 6: then moving to the side so that the team can
• 10:02
  Speaker 6: grow even more. But on the flip side, our next
• 10:06
  Speaker 6: guest came from a place of crisis when everything looked
• 10:10
  Speaker 6: perfect on paper, but inside the company it was a
• 10:13
  Speaker 6: totally different story. This is Vanessa Do, co founder and
• 10:17
  Speaker 6: former CEO of healtha Kombucha.
• 10:21
  Speaker 2: At this point, we are the bell of the ball
• 10:24
  Speaker 2: and Beverage. We're growing like everything from the outside looked great,
• 10:27
  Speaker 2: but I remember inside I felt this emotional turmoil with
• 10:31
  Speaker 2: the team, and the team is giving it. They're all,
• 10:35
  Speaker 2: but they're tired and exhausted. It's unsustainable. I just foresaw
• 10:38
  Speaker 2: that if we don't change how we're approaching this, my
• 10:42
  Speaker 2: leadership style specifically, it's almost going to be like an implosion.
• 10:47
  Speaker 6: And here are the four words that turned it around.
• 10:50
  Speaker 2: I need your help. I was like, look, you guys
• 10:54
  Speaker 2: have come to me to make the decision, and I'm
• 10:56
  Speaker 2: happy to for a very long time, but this point,
• 10:59
  Speaker 2: I need you guys because I don't have the answers.
• 11:03
  Speaker 2: And I think I was worried saying that type of
• 11:05
  Speaker 2: sentence would instill doubt or fear in the leader that
• 11:10
  Speaker 2: I am. But my executive coach really helped me to see,
• 11:12
  Speaker 2: like a business grew from zero to this, it's really incredible.
• 11:17
  Speaker 2: How do we make it more incredible? And you're just
• 11:18
  Speaker 2: saying I don't have all the answers. That's why you're here,
• 11:21
  Speaker 2: and I need your help.
• 11:25
  Speaker 6: This is one of my favorite moments of the entire season.
• 11:28
  Speaker 6: For a founder who built the company from nothing, saying
• 11:33
  Speaker 6: I need your help took real courage and it's exactly
• 11:37
  Speaker 6: what unlocked her team. So if you're leading people right
• 11:40
  Speaker 6: now and you feel like you're the only one holding
• 11:43
  Speaker 6: the whole thing together, Vanessa's story is your reminder that
• 11:47
  Speaker 6: you can put your pen down and hand it to
• 11:50
  Speaker 6: your people because at the end of the day, you
• 11:53
  Speaker 6: hired them for a reason. Vanessa's team needed her to
• 11:57
  Speaker 6: be vulnerable. But our next guest come in from a
• 12:01
  Speaker 6: totally different point of view. Building trust with your team.
• 12:05
  Speaker 6: This is Raj C. Sawdrey, Chief Commercial Payments Officer, a
• 12:09
  Speaker 6: MasterCard who spent years as a physicist before she ever
• 12:14
  Speaker 6: ran a business.
• 12:16
  Speaker 3: Trust is something that you build with time. There's this
• 12:20
  Speaker 3: famous quote you win trust in drops and you lose
• 12:23
  Speaker 3: it by the buckets, or something like that. But trust
• 12:26
  Speaker 3: is something that you build over time, with a consistency
• 12:30
  Speaker 3: of interaction, with a reputation with the transparency and clarity,
• 12:36
  Speaker 3: with the reputation of collaborating, a reputation of respecting points
• 12:40
  Speaker 3: of view, whether you agree or disagree.
• 12:45
  Speaker 6: You can hear her scientific training and how precisely she
• 12:49
  Speaker 6: talks about something as fuzzy as trust.
• 12:53
  Speaker 9: Now.
• 12:53
  Speaker 6: I pulled this clip because it's such a clean, simple
• 12:56
  Speaker 6: way to describe something we all know is true, but
• 13:00
  Speaker 6: we rarely say it out loud. Trust doesn't build the
• 13:04
  Speaker 6: way you want it to. It's slow, it's incremental, it's
• 13:09
  Speaker 6: earned in tiny moments of consistency, and it can also
• 13:13
  Speaker 6: be wiped out in a single blow. So if you're
• 13:17
  Speaker 6: a leader, this is your reminder to play the long
• 13:20
  Speaker 6: game of just consistently showing up the same way every
• 13:25
  Speaker 6: single time. Grace, Vanessa, and Raj they all had to
• 13:30
  Speaker 6: figure out how to lead their people around them. But
• 13:33
  Speaker 6: leadership doesn't happen in a vacuum. The ground underneath us
• 13:38
  Speaker 6: is constantly shifting. And that's chapter three, Leading through Change.
• 13:44
  Speaker 6: We'll be back with more leading by example after a
• 13:47
  Speaker 6: quake break. Here's the reality. The ground underneath you is
• 14:07
  Speaker 6: always moving. Market shifts, industries get disrupted, and lately that
• 14:12
  Speaker 6: disruption has a name AI. In this chapter, you'll hear
• 14:16
  Speaker 6: from Joel Coher, CEO of Human, on adapting fast when
• 14:21
  Speaker 6: crisis hits, and Jessica Jensen, chief marketing officer at LinkedIn,
• 14:25
  Speaker 6: on what actually makes you irreplaceable in the age of AI.
• 14:30
  Speaker 6: Joel Coher watched Dell grow from a one hundred million
• 14:33
  Speaker 6: dollar company into a fortune five hundred giant before going
• 14:37
  Speaker 6: on to found Human, and he'll tell you the biggest
• 14:41
  Speaker 6: lesson wasn't really about that growth. It was about everything
• 14:45
  Speaker 6: that came after.
• 14:47
  Speaker 1: You can't spend your entire life or your business life
• 14:52
  Speaker 1: trying to anticipate every problem or every crisis. We don't
• 14:56
  Speaker 1: do that here. We certainly didn't do that at Dell.
• 15:00
  Speaker 1: Those crisises are going to happen. The question is, and
• 15:03
  Speaker 1: the moment of truth is can you overcome them or not?
• 15:06
  Speaker 1: And that is a direct function of your organization's ability
• 15:12
  Speaker 1: or inability to adapt and adapt quickly.
• 15:20
  Speaker 6: We pulled this clip because it kills a myth a
• 15:23
  Speaker 6: lot of us leaders might believe, which is that good
• 15:26
  Speaker 6: planning means you never get blindsided. You will get blindsided.
• 15:32
  Speaker 6: Every leader does, and the only real competitive advantage is
• 15:36
  Speaker 6: how fast your team can adapt once it happens. Joel
• 15:40
  Speaker 6: adapted to a crisis he didn't see coming. And our
• 15:43
  Speaker 6: next guest is helping people get ahead of a shift
• 15:46
  Speaker 6: everyone can see coming. And this is Jessica Jensen, chief
• 15:50
  Speaker 6: marketing officer at LinkedIn.
• 15:53
  Speaker 9: There is a bit of a myth about the deaths
• 15:55
  Speaker 9: of the entry level job in a world of AI.
• 15:59
  Speaker 9: New roles and will emerge. But who you know and
• 16:04
  Speaker 9: your network is going to be particularly important to your
• 16:08
  Speaker 9: career progress. If I am a twenty four year old
• 16:13
  Speaker 9: and I have a profile on LinkedIn, I am sharing
• 16:16
  Speaker 9: my experience and my learnings and what I'm building on LinkedIn,
• 16:20
  Speaker 9: and I have a network of people that know me
• 16:23
  Speaker 9: and will vouch for me that is authentic and human
• 16:27
  Speaker 9: and cannot be done by a robot.
• 16:33
  Speaker 6: I wanted to include this clip because it's the most
• 16:36
  Speaker 6: direct answer I've heard all year to the question everybody
• 16:40
  Speaker 6: is quietly panicking about what does AI mean for my career?
• 16:45
  Speaker 6: Her answer wasn't learn new skills or be replaced. It
• 16:49
  Speaker 6: was lean into the things a robot fundamentally cannot do.
• 16:55
  Speaker 6: And that is your network, your story, your humanity. Someone
• 17:00
  Speaker 6: who spent years teaching people how to communicate so they
• 17:04
  Speaker 6: get noticed for all the right reasons. This one felt
• 17:07
  Speaker 6: really personal. The skills that make you memorable are about
• 17:11
  Speaker 6: to matter more, not less, Joel Jessica. They both proved
• 17:17
  Speaker 6: that adapting quickly beats predicting perfectly. But adaptability on its
• 17:23
  Speaker 6: own isn't enough. You need to know why you're adapting
• 17:27
  Speaker 6: and what it's all for. That's our final chapter, leading
• 17:31
  Speaker 6: with purpose. So once you've got the self awareness, the team,
• 17:36
  Speaker 6: and the adaptability, there's one more layer, the why. In
• 17:41
  Speaker 6: this last chapter, you'll hear from Meredith Seacrest Leech, she's
• 17:45
  Speaker 6: a CEO of the Ryan Seacrest Foundation, on what it
• 17:48
  Speaker 6: takes to keep a team connected to its mission, and
• 17:52
  Speaker 6: Ben Walter, CEO of JP Morgan Workplace Solutions on the
• 17:56
  Speaker 6: way your words carry once you're the one in charge.
• 18:00
  Speaker 6: Let's start with Meredith. Meredith Seacrest Leech runs the Ryan
• 18:05
  Speaker 6: Seacrest Foundation alongside her brother. Yes it's that Ryan Seacrest,
• 18:10
  Speaker 6: which brings media production studios into children's hospitals across the country.
• 18:16
  Speaker 6: And here's how she keeps her team from losing sight
• 18:19
  Speaker 6: of why the work matters in the first place.
• 18:23
  Speaker 10: Our efforts are supporting millions of children. This is the goal. Like,
• 18:27
  Speaker 10: we're doing wonderful things, and I want you to feel
• 18:30
  Speaker 10: inspired and not get sucked into whatever it may be
• 18:33
  Speaker 10: that you're losing sight of what the mission is.
• 18:36
  Speaker 6: And here's the actual practice she built around that.
• 18:40
  Speaker 10: We'll even in a team meeting, go around and at
• 18:42
  Speaker 10: times have a mission moment or you just reconnect to
• 18:46
  Speaker 10: why you do the job. Somebody has a story they
• 18:48
  Speaker 10: want to share of what they did that week or
• 18:51
  Speaker 10: what happened, and it's just reflecting so you don't lose
• 18:54
  Speaker 10: sight of the big picture. They might have just come
• 18:57
  Speaker 10: back from a visit in Dallas and I want to
• 19:00
  Speaker 10: the impact or how great the team there is doing
• 19:03
  Speaker 10: and the creativity of the way they're using animation.
• 19:06
  Speaker 9: We're not necessarily in the.
• 19:07
  Speaker 10: Hospital every day, but our efforts are supporting millions of children,
• 19:12
  Speaker 10: and it's at sense to keep that motivation a morale
• 19:16
  Speaker 10: as we do our daily jobs.
• 19:21
  Speaker 6: I love this clip because it turns staying connected to
• 19:24
  Speaker 6: the mission from a poster on the wall into an actual,
• 19:29
  Speaker 6: reoccurring habit. A mission moment is so simple. You literally
• 19:33
  Speaker 6: just go around the room and let someone share a
• 19:36
  Speaker 6: story that reminds a team why the work matters. And
• 19:39
  Speaker 6: if you're leading a team right now, especially one buried
• 19:43
  Speaker 6: in the day to day grind, this is something you
• 19:46
  Speaker 6: could borrow and use in your very next meeting. Meredith's
• 19:51
  Speaker 6: team draws its purpose from the people they're helping, and
• 19:55
  Speaker 6: our last guest is going to remind you that as
• 19:57
  Speaker 6: a leader, you carry purpose to whether you mean it
• 20:01
  Speaker 6: or not, in literally every word you say. This is
• 20:05
  Speaker 6: Ben Walter, CEO of JP Morgan Workplace Solutions.
• 20:10
  Speaker 4: You have to know your blast radius. I say that
• 20:12
  Speaker 4: all the time. When you're working with yourself, you decide
• 20:16
  Speaker 4: the work that's done and doesn't get done. When you're
• 20:19
  Speaker 4: the boss at the company, think about how you could
• 20:21
  Speaker 4: make sort of a flip remark like, oh, we should
• 20:23
  Speaker 4: take a look at this thing, and then a bunch
• 20:25
  Speaker 4: of people go running around and creating all this work
• 20:27
  Speaker 4: that you didn't mean for that to happen. You just
• 20:29
  Speaker 4: asked a question, but they all ran around because the
• 20:32
  Speaker 4: boss said, right, that's your blast radius. It's like every
• 20:35
  Speaker 4: little comment you make has a multiplicative effect on everything
• 20:39
  Speaker 4: you do. We've all worked for a leader who's ah,
• 20:42
  Speaker 4: this is terrible, and everything that happens is a crisis.
• 20:44
  Speaker 4: And if you're always at def Con two, then the
• 20:48
  Speaker 4: place will seize up and you can run your own
• 20:51
  Speaker 4: life that way. But when you start to scale, the
• 20:53
  Speaker 4: impact of that becomes enormous.
• 20:58
  Speaker 6: I wanted to end on this because it's a clip
• 21:01
  Speaker 6: that made me personally sit back and think about every
• 21:05
  Speaker 6: word or every offhand comment I've ever made to my
• 21:08
  Speaker 6: own team. Ben's point is that the higher up you go,
• 21:13
  Speaker 6: the less your words are just words. They become instructions,
• 21:18
  Speaker 6: even when you didn't mean for them to be. And
• 21:21
  Speaker 6: that's not a reason to stay quiet, but it is
• 21:24
  Speaker 6: a reason to be intentional. Knowing your blast radius isn't
• 21:30
  Speaker 6: about shrinking yourself as a leader. It's about understanding the
• 21:34
  Speaker 6: size of the room you're actually standing in. So if
• 21:38
  Speaker 6: I zoom out on this entire season, here's what I
• 21:41
  Speaker 6: keep coming back to. Leading yourself, leading your people, leading
• 21:46
  Speaker 6: through change, leading with purpose. These aren't just four separate skills.
• 21:52
  Speaker 6: They're really one skill practiced in four different directions. Anya
• 21:57
  Speaker 6: and Shelley taught us that you can can't lead anyone
• 22:01
  Speaker 6: else until you've made peace with yourself, your setbacks, and
• 22:05
  Speaker 6: your purpose. Grace. Vanessa and Raj showed us that the
• 22:10
  Speaker 6: strongest teams are built on delegation and trust, not control.
• 22:16
  Speaker 6: Joel and Jessica Jensen reminded us that the ground will
• 22:20
  Speaker 6: always move and adaptability beats prediction every time. And Meredith
• 22:27
  Speaker 6: and Ben they closed the loop by showing us that
• 22:30
  Speaker 6: the reason behind the work and the words you choose
• 22:33
  Speaker 6: while doing it carry more weight than almost anything else
• 22:37
  Speaker 6: you do as a leader. If there's one thread running
• 22:42
  Speaker 6: through all nine of these conversations, it's this. The leaders
• 22:46
  Speaker 6: who really stood out weren't the ones with the most answers.
• 22:50
  Speaker 6: They were the ones who were the most honest, the
• 22:53
  Speaker 6: most authentic with themselves, with their teams, and with the
• 22:58
  Speaker 6: moments they were actually in. And that's what leading by
• 23:02
  Speaker 6: example has meant to me this season, and I hope
• 23:06
  Speaker 6: some piece of that sticks with you too. I want
• 23:09
  Speaker 6: to say thank you so much for spending this season
• 23:12
  Speaker 6: with us. Whether this is the first episode of Leading
• 23:15
  Speaker 6: by Example you've ever heard, or you've been with us
• 23:18
  Speaker 6: since episode one, I am so grateful that you are here.
• 23:23
  Speaker 6: This season, we heard from CEOs and founders, scientists and storytellers,
• 23:29
  Speaker 6: people who've built billion dollar businesses, and people who've rebuilt
• 23:34
  Speaker 6: themselves after losing everything they thought they wanted, and every
• 23:39
  Speaker 6: single one of them showed up, honestly, and that's exactly
• 23:43
  Speaker 6: what made this season what it was. If you enjoyed
• 23:50
  Speaker 6: this episode, or really any episode this season, please take
• 23:54
  Speaker 6: a second to rate and review Leading by Example. It
• 23:58
  Speaker 6: genuinely helps more people this show, and if there's a
• 24:02
  Speaker 6: guest or a topic you'd love to hear from next,
• 24:05
  Speaker 6: I want to know you can always reach out and
• 24:08
  Speaker 6: tell us. I'm Jessica Chen, the author of Smart Not Loud,
• 24:13
  Speaker 6: How to Get Noticed at work for all the Right
• 24:15
  Speaker 6: reasons in the CEO of Soulcast Media, a communications training company.
• 24:20
  Speaker 6: For more on what I do, head to Solcastmedia dot
• 24:24
  Speaker 6: com or you can find me on LinkedIn, and Instagram.
• 24:27
  Speaker 6: A huge thank you to our production team at Ruby Studio,
• 24:31
  Speaker 6: Matt Stillo, Kelly Kyle, and Sierra Spreen for putting this
• 24:35
  Speaker 6: entire season together. So this is the last episode of
• 24:38
  Speaker 6: the season, but it's not goodbye. We're already thinking about
• 24:42
  Speaker 6: who we want to bring to you next, and when
• 24:45
  Speaker 6: we're ready, we'll be back with more conversations, more lessons,
• 24:49
  Speaker 6: and more leaders worth learning from. But until then, thank
• 24:53
  Speaker 6: you so much for listening, and I'll see you again
• 24:55
  Speaker 6: soon