Latest / The Generalist World Pod / Take ‘Chief of Staff’ off the pedestal

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Take ‘Chief of Staff’ off the pedestal · The Generalist World Pod

• 0:00
  Hey, it's Millie, and welcome to the Generalist World Podcast. This is the podcast for people who have never fit into a box at work, and to be honest, we don't really want to.
• 0:09
  Every week, I chat with a new member of Generalist World and I share their stories, their philosophies, their frameworks of how they are living their life and creating work that actually aligns with their generalist skill set.
• 0:22
  So if you are someone who has had a non-linear, squiggly career, this is the podcast for you. Courtney, welcome to the Generalist World Pod. How you going? Really good. How are you, Millie? I'm doing great.
• 0:34
  We're here, we are at Ramen Space, our friend and community member, Charlie. And I'm really excited to get into this, 'cause we were just jamming, um, over a little cup of tea and water.
• 0:46
  And I wonder if you can take me back to couple of years ago, I think you've been part of GW for three years, and take me back to, like, what was happening in your world when you decided, "Hey, maybe, maybe this is the place for me."
• 1:00
  Yeah. I was working in a digital agency at the time, um, and I'd been there for almost three years, and I think I had always had this desire to work in startups.
• 1:11
  Like when I was at uni, did some internships in some early stage startups and really got a taste for it.
• 1:15
  Left uni, started as a management consultant, as you do, thinking it would give me all the experience I needed to go do whatever I wanted for the rest of my life.
• 1:25
  Very squiggly path, as you [laughs] I'm sure you hear from everybody who you speak to. So five years in management consulting.
• 1:32
  Took a year out to go full time for a year with the Army Reserve, which we can get into that [laughs] whole, like we could talk for the whole podcast just on that probably.
• 1:42
  Um, but I came back from that and realized I definitely did not wanna be a consultant anymore. I wanted to do more of what I thought I wanted. But it was gonna take me a few steps to get there- Mm-hmm...
• 1:52
  and build the right experience. So I was at that agency for a while. Joined as a product manager, yeah. Joined as a product manager, ended up being the ops director of that agency. Mm-hmm.
• 2:04
  Like small place, but kind of got to the point where I felt like I needed the next thing, and it was time to, like, jump into the deep end and make the career move, and that's when I found GW. So I,
• 2:17
  I think I was looking f- like trying to figure out, like, what is the right next step? Like, how do I explain these skills that I have? 'Cause they don't really fit into any of these boxes that I'm seeing.
• 2:28
  Classic generalist. [laughs] Didn't know the word generalist at the time, and I think I said to you earlier, I found GW, I think, like a day before you were closing an intake.
• 2:39
  [laughs] And the payment link wasn't letting me through. [laughs] And I remember desperately emailing you like, "Millie, let me in, please." [laughs] "I need to join this community. These are my people."
• 2:48
  Fin- yeah, so I finally felt like, "Oh, this is a word I can use to describe myself, and I feel like I understand." Mm. Uh, I, I love it. Um, and classic me, like the link isn't working, you know.
• 3:00
  [laughs] Well, I'm very glad that you emailed and that we're here, that we're here now. Uh, I, I would love to get into what was that year like for you in the Army Reserve?
• 3:10
  What, what does that mean for people who aren't familiar? Yeah. So I joined the Army Reserve maybe a couple years into my consulting career, and then I was do- like, it was just something I did at the same time as work.
• 3:22
  So the training commitment is, like, one evening a week, one weekend a month roughly. Okay. And I did that for a few years.
• 3:29
  And then kind of at the point that I was getting itchy feet around the consulting job, we, the regiment that I was part of called the Royal Yeomanry, we were asked to fill, like, a commitment on the, on NATO's enhanced forward presence operation.
• 3:43
  So the British Army ran the Estonian battle group, I think it still does run the Estonian battle group. Hmm. Um, but also provides a squadron for reconnaissance to the US battle group. Mm-hmm.
• 3:53
  And so this is like every six months it rotates. A different squadron from a different, like a different unit in the Army fills that position, and we were asked as a reserve unit to fill that position.
• 4:03
  And so it's kind of like a who, who wants to go? And I was like, "Yep." Me. [laughs] "Me, me, please. Me."
• 4:12
  I mean, very excited about it, and also, like, completely unsure of how I was gonna handle that, what that would look like. Was I capable of doing all of these things?
• 4:22
  Like, I was in a, I was in a light cavalry unit, so one of, at the time, and still, like, very few women in a ground close combat unit. Wow. There was a selection process for the troop leaders who were gonna go.
• 4:33
  There, I think there were five of us who wanted to be troop leaders on that tour, and three of us who actually got to go. So- Hmm...
• 4:40
  throughout that year of being mobilized full time, there was a period where I was kinda going through this process and didn't even know if I was gonna get the role that I wanted to go on the tour to- Oh, wow.
• 4:49
  It's a year of this process. Well, as in you get mobilized for a year with the... So the Army Reserve, like, takes you out of your civilian job for a year. Got it.
• 4:59
  And it was six months of pre-deployment training and then six months actually on the deployment. Wow. So for, like, a fairly large chunk of that pre-deployment training part, it was, like, also a selection process. Hmm.
• 5:11
  And for, like, the ramp-up to that year. And, like, how do you deal with that uncertainty of knowing or of, of putting your hand up and saying, "Yep, I'm keen for this," and holding this truth of like, "I don't know.
• 5:26
  I've never done this before"? And, like, is this a pattern that shows up in your life? And if so, like, how do you work through it? Yeah. I think yes.
• 5:33
  I think maybe that's why I love working in early stage companies as well, or, like, dealing with that ambiguity and that uncertainty. Do I find it really uncomfortable? Yes.
• 5:43
  I also think I, as a person, like, growth comes from a place of discomfort. Mm. And I often will throw myself into something, not necessarily to prove something to other people, but to prove something to myself. Mm.
• 5:56
  And I kind of won't believe... My self-belief comes from, like, proving to myself that I'm capable of something that I wasn't sure about whether I could do. Oof, I love that.
• 6:05
  I, I heard the other day- Or I read somewhere, um, you know, stop trying to prove yourself and just focus on improving yourself Mm And it was such a click moment for me 'cause, like, to prove yourself is a very external thing, right?
• 6:21
  It's like other people have the control if they're going to say yes or no, like, she is worthy, and there is, there is proof there.
• 6:28
  When what you can control is, like, improving yourself, and that's a very, like, internal thing. What's your relationship with, like, imposter syndrome? Oh, like, massive imposter syndrome. [laughs] Big relationship.
• 6:41
  It's real. [laughs] We have, we have a very close relationship. [laughs] Yeah. I think that comes from having... It's all kind of driven by the same thing. We're getting very philosophical.
• 6:50
  Like, having very- Let's do it. [laughs] Very high standards for myself. Like, I will often, like, I will gladly receive praise from other people for things, as we all love to.
• 7:01
  Sometimes I won't believe it unless I, like, really believe it myself. Mm. And I think maybe there's a little bit of that that's less healthy, but there's also a lot of growth that comes from that.
• 7:10
  Like, I'm quite happy to throw myself in a deep end and figure it out. Mm. Or, like, I ran a half marathon at the Hackney Half earlier this year. Nice.
• 7:20
  And was, like, super happy with the time I ran, but I absolutely hated running two years ago. Mm.
• 7:26
  And I kind of just decided, like, A, I have a friend who's amazing at running, and encouraged a group of us to do a half marathon a couple years ago- Nice... which- Join your friend like that... love that.
• 7:36
  [laughs] We've all traded hobbies. But I was like, either I'm gonna have a terrible time and I'm gonna be rubbish at this, or, like, the only way to get over that is just to do the thing that I don't like- Mm...
• 7:47
  and get to the point where it becomes enjoyable or I feel like it's okay to do it, and that's, like, that definitely repeats in my life, like- Yeah... do something hard, figure it out, get better at it. Yeah.
• 8:01
  And when you do that again and again and again, you learn that a lot of things are learnable. Mm. You're like, "Oh, I can just do things, and I can just figure those things out." Um, when...
• 8:12
  So it sounds like you're someone [laughs] who's quite drawn to, like, challenges. Yeah. [laughs] This is the sense I'm getting from you. Like, that sounds like a juicy- Yeah. [laughs]... challenge.
• 8:20
  How do you decide what challenges you wanna work on? H- do you have a, a way of thinking about that, or is it kinda like something comes across your path and it's a yes or no in the moment?
• 8:31
  I think it massively depends, and that, I know that's an annoying- [laughs]... it's an annoying answer. In, there's, like, work and life, I guess. Mm.
• 8:38
  And I think work it's like what's the context of the priorities that we're working on? Like, is this thing worth sinking time into?
• 8:45
  The perpetual do we build versus buy decision, especially being at early stage, like, less, less resourced places where you might need to hack something together in a way that you could just, like, build a platform that does all of it really well.
• 9:00
  Sure. Those challenges I enjoy.
• 9:02
  Like, the company that I'm working at now, I've learnt how to use a newer marketing system and how to, like, web hook a bunch of things together to get information into the right places because
• 9:12
  somebody had to figure it out. Yeah. And, like, that's really fun. I think in life I'm quite goal-driven anyway, but I, I also subscribe to you can do anything you want, but you can't do everything all at the same time.
• 9:27
  Mm. And so I'll often just choose something. Like, for a long time it's been running- Mm... 'cause it was, like, a goal I could have outside of work that kept me going. It was, like, something to focus on.
• 9:38
  And now I'm actually in a period where I feel like, hmm, what's the next- Hmm... thing? And I don't know that I've figured it out yet. Do you have some options, some on the table that you're tossing up?
• 9:48
  I have a couple of, like, more running goals that I could work towards. Yeah.
• 9:51
  [laughs] But I've just had, because I've just had, like, a bit of time out of routine, like, got married, spent a couple of years, a couple of years? Couple of weeks, like, on holiday after that.
• 10:03
  [laughs] I would love to just spend a couple- My life is a holiday. [laughs] My life's a holiday.
• 10:06
  Um, getting back in, into a routine has meant that, like, I've not picked those up as much, so I'm like, is it a running thing?
• 10:12
  Or, like, now that I've got a little bit of space and distance from that, do I choose something else? Mm. Undecided. The generalist dilemma. Yeah. [laughs] Ah, familiar. It shows up in many ways. Yeah.
• 10:22
  [laughs] Uh, so you have, you're now working with this kinda early-stage startup. Yep. And it's fairly recent, right? Yes. So
• 10:31
  I wanna kinda touch on, like, when you kinda got that job because a lot of folks are saying, we all know what the market's like, we don't need to, like, reiterate that, but there's a lot of people job searching right now.
• 10:41
  Yeah. And, um, something I hear often is people are like, "I don't know where I fit. I don't know what kind of companies to apply for. I don't know how to, like, pitch myself."
• 10:50
  Can you take us back to maybe the interview process or when you got the job? What worked? H- how did you land the job? Yeah.
• 10:57
  I have a really annoying answer, which is that one of the co-founders reached out to me on LinkedIn because they were hiring. But- Interesting... I think the, like, there's also lessons to be learned from that. Yeah.
• 11:05
  And, like, this is, I, I felt really proud of that at the time because I had made conscious decisions to do things that I thought were going to put me in a position to be in the role that I wanted to be in.
• 11:16
  And, like, early stage women's health startup in an operations role is, like- It... it. Yeah, exactly. So I, when I left the digital agency, this is kind of going back to career story, and when I joined GW I was
• 11:32
  looking at product or chief of staff roles, and I couldn't really decide between the two. But had more kind of technical experience- Mm... so it was easier to sell myself into that kind of role.
• 11:43
  Landed a role at a fintech startup that was, like, also super tiny, I think there were 10 of us there. Doing product work, quote-unquote, but then also it was a small team. I was one of, like, two non-developers. Okay.
• 11:57
  So was also doing kind of everything else. [laughs] As you do.
• 12:01
  And kind of shifted myself into that more, like, chief of staff-y type role and realized that actually what I really loved doing was the filling the gaps between everything, translating, thinking about, like, where do we want to get and how do we get there-
• 12:16
  Unfortunately, we all got made redundant overnight in that role. So as much as I loved it, would've stayed there for a while- Yeah... startup happened. Yeah.
• 12:26
  Um, and at least at that point I had the conviction that like the chief of staff role was what I wanted to go for. So was searching, landed a chief of staff role at another health tech startup,
• 12:39
  which like exactly the title I wanted. Didn't work out to be the right business. Mm-hmm. Um, but I think put me in a position to have like basically the right profile- Mm... to be found by the people who
• 12:54
  were looking for what I could offer essentially. S- and so the co-founder of this just cold DM'd you one day and was like, "Hey, we're starting this." And what, what did they see in your profile? What, what was it?
• 13:07
  'Cause I imagine if you like look up chief of staff London on LinkedIn, there's gonna be lots. So there must have been something in there that stood out. Do you know what it was? Good question. I'll have to ask.
• 13:18
  [laughs] To ask her. Phone a friend. [laughs] Um, I think it helped that... This is all like tiny pieces falling into place, right? Like- Sure... some of it is right place, right time.
• 13:30
  But when I was looking for that product role, I joined a job board called Cord, which is like very developer-focused, but they also had some like products, operations tech roles in there, and my profile was still on there.
• 13:44
  And so at the point when I realized that first chief of staff ro- the chief of staff role at the other health tech was not necessarily the right thing for me, it was like, okay, time to like update stuff- Mm-hmm...
• 13:54
  and think about where the next move is without, you know, going and applying for everything immediately. And I ha- I think I just happened to have updated my profile on Cord- Mm. Okay...
• 14:06
  and that's what they were using to lo- they were looking for an engineer, but they, I think they just figured, we'll see what we else, what else we can find in terms of profiles for the people we're looking for here.
• 14:15
  I think it was being mission-driven, 'cause that's really important.
• 14:19
  Like, that's important to me and it's one of the values that we hold like really strongly at work as well, and doing kind of early stage scrappy things in operations. Mm. Mm.
• 14:30
  Have you ever been working with someone who didn't see or didn't feel like they saw the value of the skillset that you have? And if so, what was that experience like? And like h- how did you work with that?
• 14:44
  I think fortunately I've not really been in that position. Mm. Maybe like back in, in my consulting days, I think I...
• 14:54
  One of my favorite projects that I worked on was at a, a kind of challenger asset manager, and they were like very tech-forward. They actually ran the whole business on Agile. Like all the teams- Mm. Mm...
• 15:06
  had sprints and Jira tickets. It was kind of wild at the time, thinking back at it- Yeah... almost 10 years ago.
• 15:11
  But got involved in a software build, basically, like building a web app that was a dashboard from scratch with their head of digital, and kind of learnt everything I know now about software development and the soft development life cycle from him.
• 15:24
  And I think at that point I was like, ah, I can... I have this skill set that helps with starting things- Mm... and figuring it out that maybe isn't going to be what I get from this particular career path.
• 15:38
  And I think that like kind of sowed the seed of think about where to go- Yeah... next or like where I'm gonna fit better. Mm.
• 15:45
  Okay, so you like challenges, and I feel like you've got this like meta skill of being able to see a big picture and be like, "Actually, this isn't where I'm thriving, and, and maybe I need to pivot or change."
• 15:57
  Um, is there like... I don't... May- I'm, I'm trying to think of if you were to look forward, say, a year, what would happen this time next year? What are we? July. Yeah.
• 16:10
  What would happen July 2027 that you would be like, "Heck yeah, that was an amazing year"? And it could be personal or work. I think for me, I'm gonna come... I'm gonna give you a work answer, I think. Okay.
• 16:22
  And it would be like actually taking the business through some more scale. Mm. So like I've done...
• 16:29
  Like what I was really excited about joining this company so early wa- and we're VC-backed, is like going through the pre-seed to seed to series A to- Mm... like actually seeing that arc all the way through. Yeah.
• 16:42
  And so I think seeing, like gaining more responsibility, going through that scaling process, like working out all the niggles that come with that and figuring out what works for...
• 16:53
  Like every business is different, right? Like, the, the same processes and structures won't always work in different- Sure... places. So I think owning the challenge of figuring out how a bigger business works- Mm...
• 17:06
  well in a year's time, I'd be like, "Great." I love that. Yeah. And it's its own beast, right? That like... Yeah. Um, wh- where do you go to learn? So like do you have mentors?
• 17:18
  Is, uh, your, is your leadership like great at teaching? Do you... What, where do you learn? Um- How do you learn that? [laughs] Good question. Like a- anywhere and everywhere. Lo- I learn lots from the people in GW.
• 17:30
  I mean- Mm... I, this is a slight tangent, but I, I remember I grew up rowing. I did lots of sport.
• 17:35
  And on a sports team, I always think you wanna be the worst person in the best team that you can achieve to be in because you have all these people around you to learn from.
• 17:44
  And I think as kind of uncomfortable as that can be in life, I love that position of being like, "I think that I'm the, the like worst person in this team, therefore I can learn so much from all these other people."
• 17:57
  Obviously, I don't think I'm the worst person every time [laughs] Yeah. [laughs] But the philosophy of like there's something you can learn from everyone. So yes, like- Mm... my bosses at work.
• 18:07
  Like I have a great like ops mentor who's the COO of another startup who I see like once every couple of months and just kind of talk about stuff- Yeah... and how things can, like how he's done stuff differently. Um-
• 18:22
  The, the good old internet. Yeah. [laughs] Yeah, I just remember, like, when I joined GW and still, like, I, I spend less time on it now than I would like to. Early-stage startups- [laughs]...
• 18:34
  can be pretty time-intensive. But I just always leave thinking, "Wow, these people are so amazing." Like, so many people are doing so many different things in so many ways that I would never have thought of.
• 18:43
  And just, like, there's a lot of learning and inspiration from just understanding how other people approach challenges or build things to solve their problems. Yeah, totally. And two things.
• 18:54
  I think one is, like, one of my favorite things about GW becoming a lifetime membership is that it, it reflects a lot more on how life actually works, where like, life is ebbs and flows. Mm.
• 19:06
  So even in, like, my local community, I'm not always on. I'm not constantly, like, contributing and supporting. Sometimes life happens, and I'm in London, I'm not there. And I think that more accurately reflects.
• 19:18
  It's like, okay, so we're all in this for the long term, and when you need us, come and get involved, and otherwise we've got your back. And plus one to just having...
• 19:29
  I don't know if there's anywhere else that just has this, like, smorgasbord of diversity of what people are doing, and oftentimes jobs that I didn't even know that was a job.
• 19:38
  Yeah, I think that was- Didn't know that was a thing... one of the things that hit me, especially, like, when I joined and I was like, "What, what is the career that I, like, what job do I want?" There are so many jobs.
• 19:45
  I'm like, "How is that a... Like, wow, that's a cool job." Yeah. "I never knew that was a job." [laughs] Yeah. Yeah, 100%. It is a constant source, renewable source- [laughs]... of learning and inspiration.
• 19:56
  What do you think, where do you think we're going? Do you have any predictions for what's coming next? For generalists or, like, work in, writ large?
• 20:05
  Uh, probably work at large, but if you have any predictions [laughs] for generalists, go on. [laughs] I mean, I'm inclined to think that generalists are gonna take over the world someday. [laughs] Um, I,
• 20:16
  I think AI is obviously gonna make a load of changes, but I think there's a big part of you need to understand where AI actually sits and what you do with the outputs of it.
• 20:26
  Basically, I think everyone said a year ago, "AI's gonna get rid of everyone's jobs." It's not happened. I think we keep saying that, and I don't think it's gonna happen in the next year either.
• 20:36
  Even, like, developers still have jobs because it can't produce enough, like, high-quality code to completely eradicate that.
• 20:46
  I also think, I read a really interesting article, I think it was on The Atlantic recently, about... I can't remember the exact wording of it.
• 20:52
  But basically, people who want to use AI to do less thinking and people who want to use AI to, like, challenge them and- Mm... do different thinking and, like, think more. Ooh. And this, like- Big difference, right?
• 21:04
  Yeah, exactly. Huge difference. Mm.
• 21:05
  'Cause I think we, we're n- we're not living in this utopia now of, oh, AI can, makes us do everything fast- or can do everything faster than we previously could, so therefore we have more leisure time and we can do more.
• 21:14
  That we're just frying our brains by doing more and being more productive. Mm. But there's a real danger of losing the ability to, like, think critically, and I'm quite conscious of that in my use of AI as well. Mm-hmm.
• 21:29
  I try not to say, "Give me the answer to this." I'm like, "Here are some thoughts on this. Challenge my assumptions- Mm... or produce something from, like, notes that I've already given it where I've done the thinking."
• 21:40
  Yeah. Like, there are plenty of things where you can just, you know, outsource the, the thinking. There are lots more things where you still need a human brain to do that. Totally. Yeah. I think two things.
• 21:53
  One is I, I've seen this kind of sentiment recently- Mm... where people are like, "I'm getting so much done, and I feel so empty at the end of the day because I haven't actually done it." Yeah.
• 22:07
  I have been like, allow, allow, allow, allow. [laughs] And there is no satisfaction- Mm... that comes.
• 22:15
  You get an output, um, but there, there's, like, no deeper satisfaction, and I wonder if we're in this, like, kind of trough of disillusionment- Mm... of, of AI.
• 22:24
  And the other thing I'm seeing is, uh, exactly what you said where there's been this, like, almost visceral fear that, like... It's almost like AI is right here, and it's coming. Mm.
• 22:35
  It's coming for your job, and it's coming- [laughs]... for my job. It's coming for everyone's job.
• 22:38
  And it seems like in the last, like, maybe even the last couple of weeks, people are, like, taking the foot off the gas of that- Mm... a bit, and they're like, "Oh."
• 22:46
  You know, I, I know there's been a lot of layoffs and a lot of redundancies. I'm not taking- Yeah... away from that. There's also been a lot of rehires where- Yeah...
• 22:53
  companies are like, "Maybe we were a bit, bit fast there. Bit fast." So how are you thinking about...
• 23:01
  I don't love the, the term AI-proofing or, like, future-proofing, but do you think about it, how it shows up in your role, and how, how do you think about protecting and keeping yourself resilient at work?
• 23:13
  I wouldn't say that I think about it day to day, I think because even with AI it's still hard to solve all the challenges of, like, how do I get this piece of the business to speak to this piece of the business, and how do we make sure we're moving towards our goals in the right way?
• 23:30
  I think, like, AI cannot, at this point, and I suspect it might take a while to get there, like, orchestrate the w- like, the, the brain of an- Mm... organization- Mm-hmm... that well.
• 23:42
  Or, like, maybe it can if you invest a sig- significant amount into it. I've seen examples of businesses that are, like, fully AI native, and they have, like, every single piece of context and maybe at that point, sure.
• 23:54
  But also to that point, tokens cost money. Yeah. And I think, like, especially over the last few months, that's become much more of a conversation.
• 24:01
  It's like, okay, we can do all of this stuff with AI, but actually, like, it's gonna start costing everyone a lot of money eventually, and it might actually just be more cost-effective to have a human do some of that work.
• 24:11
  So it's full- Full circle... full circle that we've come full circle, right? Wait, what if we just use humans? Okay. Yeah, and it's, like, token optimization- Yeah... and all of this stuff.
• 24:19
  So I think staying resilient to it is, like, understanding how it works. Like, what are the best use cases for it that actually add value? Mm.
• 24:27
  And, like, particularly at a smaller organization as well where- And also there are plenty of applications where I work- like I work at a health tech company where you can't just throw stuff into AI because- Yeah...
• 24:39
  you have patient data or things that need to be more secure. We haven't got, you know, self-hosted everything everywhere because we don't have the, the infrastructure for it at Preceas. Sure. And
• 24:52
  you have to be a bit more like agile and creative around what that looks like. So- Yeah... I'm using enough of my brain that I don't feel like my job is gonna be overtaken by AI- Long on the brain... imminently.
• 25:02
  [laughs] Long on the brain.
• 25:04
  Uh, yeah, I saw someone, uh, I think it was Claire Vo, who, um, uh, she's kind of like tech and product, and she was saying that recently when people are like, "I'm so productive with AI," she says, "Oh, like, what are you doing?"
• 25:18
  And she's like, "When you actually ask people, like, well, what are you doing or what have you made? It's kinda like, well, I, you know, automated this workflow- [laughs]... or," and it's actually...
• 25:29
  I think if we were to really see behind the scenes of people's, everyday people's laptops, I wonder how much it- Yeah... it feels... It, it's this like sense of being really productive and sense- Mm...
• 25:41
  of these things being really game-changing. Uh, but I think we're gonna be okay. I think we're gonna be okay in the long term. Is there anything that you really wanna talk about?
• 25:53
  Is there anything that, like, you're like we're gonna... Our listeners tuning in, it could be a message, it could be an idea. I think my biggest message is, like, if... This is, this is my imposter syndrome speaking.
• 26:05
  [laughs] If I can be a chief of staff twice at early stage startups,
• 26:12
  I think I had this view that it was, like, this big important role that, like, only really amazing people did, and you had to, like, tick all these boxes, and then I did it.
• 26:21
  And actually, like, if I can do it, you could do it, too, is my biggest message.
• 26:24
  I think, like, it's a job title that particularly for generalists, 'cause it's like plays on our skill set really, really well, like draws on our skill set really, really well, is kind of put up on a pedestal almost. Mm.
• 26:36
  Mm-hmm. And I don't think it needs to be. Mm. I love that. And for if anyone hasn't heard, like maybe someone is hearing chief of staff for the first time, can you even begin to describe- [laughs] Oh...
• 26:49
  what is a chief of staff? That is a great question- [laughs]... with many answers. The an- it depends on who you report to, it depends on the business, it depends on what the priorities are.
• 26:59
  It can, it can kind of be anything and everything, but generally being, like, the right-hand person to an exec or a senior leader within a company,
• 27:11
  kind of being a delegated version of them, dealing with leading projects. Like, leadership without authority, I think, is one of the biggest parts- Mm. Amazing... of being a chief of staff.
• 27:23
  Just figuring out what needs to be done to achieve goals and making it happen cross-functionally, I think- Mm... is the, like, simplest way I can possibly put it.
• 27:34
  [laughs] Well, if anyone has extra questions for Courtney, you can get in touch. We will link all of her links in the show notes- [laughs]... and you can get in touch with all your questions.
• 27:43
  Thank you so much for coming on the GW pod. Thanks so much for having me.