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Welcome to the new manager 
podcast. 

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I'm your host, Kim nickel. 
Hello and welcome. 

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I'm glad you're here and I hope 
you're doing well. 

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I for one I'm doing great. 
I'm actually doing a lot better 

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than I was a week ago when I had
a cold and I was feeling very 

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low energy and congested and it 
was not that fun. 

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I am on the other side of it now
so that's really good. 

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But it did interfere with some 
of my plans and it also gave me 

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We the topic for today which is 
asking yourself. 

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Where is my growth? 
Let me explain what I mean. 

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So when I got sick, I hadn't 
planned it. 

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I had a full calendar of work 
things and personal things, and 

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as I started to feel my body 
slowing down, I had a little 

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moment of panic. 
It was this thought of, oh no, I

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can't get sick. 
There's too much to do. 

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I have too many things? 
I need to do. 

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And I realized as the week began
to progress and I was feeling 

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the effectiveness, I realized 
that I was going to need to make

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some decisions. 
I was going to need to decide. 

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How did I want to spend my time?
My energy and my attention in 

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light of the fact that I had 
less energy than I typically 

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would, and I had less energy 
than I had planned to. 

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To have, we're expected to have.
And I thought, you know, this is

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actually a really a perfect 
situation in the sense that when

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you are at work, in managing 
people, there will be lots of 

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times. 
When you also have to make this 

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decision when you have less 
resources, less energy, less 

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time, less headcount, less 
budget. 

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Let you know, there are always 
constraints. 

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And sometimes there are 
constraints, we don't plan for 

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Don't expect but they show up 
anyways and so in that moment 

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there are a couple of choices we
get to make. 

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Number one, do I push through? 
Is that what is the best option 

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here? 
Do I just suck it up and put in 

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the hours and kind of try to 
just power my way through this 

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difficult situation or is what I
need to do to actually dial 

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things back and Slow down, take 
time to recover and refresh and 

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allow that not. 
Everything is going to get done.

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Maybe what I need to do right 
now is to delegate some things, 

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instead of trying to do all of 
it, can I assign or delegate 

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some of it to somebody else. 
Maybe what I need to do in this 

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moment is have a conversation to
reset expectations, that might 

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require That someone feels 
disappointed because things 

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won't happen in the timeline or 
in the manner that we had 

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initially expected. 
But maybe the growth is in 

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having that uncomfortable and 
direct and clear conversation. 

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So that decision point when you 
realize, okay I had a plan, 

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things are changing in a way I 
hadn't anticipated. 

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What do I want to do now, the 
way I I want you to think about 

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this, is from this perspective, 
of where is your growth, right? 

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Like, ask that of yourself. 
Where is my growth in this 

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situation and depending on how 
you answer that can guide you 

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into the direction that you 
choose. 

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And one of the ways to know 
where your growth is is to ask 

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yourself? 
Well, what is it that I would 

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normally do is my habit. 
The habit of pushing through is 

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that Kind of the thing that I 
tend to go to First, is the 

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thing that I tend to go to, you 
know, delegating first is that 

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what I tend to do is the thing I
tend to do having a direct clear

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conversation that tends to be 
not the thing that most people 

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do at first. 
Especially, you know, I find a 

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lot of it is, you know, we're 
resilient self-reliant, you 

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know, can do people so very 
often the first thought is I 

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have to do this. 
I have to make it work. 

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Have to do it all on my own and 
this is what can also roll into 

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especially over time, burnout 
and anxiety, and it actually 

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prevents us from developing all 
these other skills. 

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The skill of having the direct 
conversation, the skill of 

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allowing someone to feel 
disappointed or frustrated, the 

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skill of being able to delegate 
or to re-evaluate the plan. 

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When we keep this kind of 
single-minded focus. 

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And we tend to power through 
things. 

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I mean, that's an okay approach 
from time to time, but I really 

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want you to have a more robust 
set of options. 

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So, asking yourself, right? 
Like, where's my growth in this 

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situation? 
What's the thing that I tend to 

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do first and then asking maybe 
there is another direction that 

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might challenge me to do but 
that's what I'm going to choose.

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So for me, you know, a week or 
two ago, when I was not feeling 

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that great and I realized, you 
know, I think I'm going to need 

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to re-evaluate all of the things
on my to-do list and I ended up 

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deciding to not record a podcast
episode for that week. 

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And part of me felt really 
guilty and bad like ah but you 

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know, I wanted to get this 
message to you and I wanted to 

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you know, maintain my streak of 
headed heading a an episode 

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every week. 
But when I paused and thought 

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about it and I thought, okay, 
Kim, where is your growth? 

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Here is this the situation where
you need to push through and 

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just like crank it out or is 
this the situation where you 

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need to pause? 
You need to pull back and take 

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time to rest and recover and 
redirect your energy in a 

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different kind of way. 
And I ended up choosing to do 

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that. 
So I'm going to choose to rest. 

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I think that's going to be where
my growth is in this situation 

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and I'm going to manage my mind 
so I'm not putting a ton of 

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guilt or pressure or self 
judgement on myself in this. 

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But actually realizing I'm doing
this from a very strategic 

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place. 
I'm making this Choice 

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intentionally and I'm not going 
to feel bad about that. 

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I'm actually making this 
decision based on the 

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information that I have and the 
landscape that I'm And, and kind

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of assessing like, what is the 
best use of the time and the 

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energy and the attention that I 
currently have available in 

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light of all of these other 
things. 

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And so I started to think about 
it, also in terms of strategic 

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failure, so uncomfortable, when 
you're used to being a very high

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achieving person but strategic 
failure is when you decide what 

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is the thing? 
I will allow to fail right now 

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and I am alone. 
Allowing it to fail for a very 

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intentional and strategic 
reason. 

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Because I need to put my energy 
into this other thing instead. 

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And I was talking with one of my
clients about this and they use 

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this fantastic term and it was 
this idea of the most valuable 

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problem. 
So if you've got all these 

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different problems to solve, 
let's say you've got five 

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different problems and you're 
trying to solve all of them and 

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you have not Energy or the 
resources for all five, what's 

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the most valuable one you can 
solve for? 

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Put your energy on that one? 
Knowing that there might be some

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failure because you're not 
putting the attention on some of

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those other things, but you make
that choice, intentionally and 

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knowingly, and when you do, then
that gives you the option to 

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address them in a different way 
to do. 

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So whether that means having a 
conversation about it or 

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resetting your own Like tations,
but you don't beat up on 

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yourself for it. 
Instead, you simply acknowledge.

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Okay. 
This is a strategic failure. 

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I'm willing to take, because 
this other thing is what I'm 

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going to choose to put my 
attention, and my work towards, 

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I think, I've mentioned this 
maybe in the last episode or so,

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but sometimes there are no 
Solutions. 

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There are just decisions and for
you, what I want to encourage 

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and invite you to is, Position 
of from a strategic perspective,

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from a big picture perspective, 
what are you choosing and why? 

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That becomes a lot easier and a 
lot more of a grounded place to 

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live and work from rather than 
feeling like it's your job to do

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everything. 
It's not. 

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It's actually your job to make 
decisions about what is kind of 

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coming at you. 
That's also, what gets you out 

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of Lang like have to play 
whack-a-mole and just respond 

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and react to everything that 
pops up instead. 

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It's like, okay, here's the 
decision. 

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I'm going to make about what I'm
doing and why and then you 

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manage everything else around 
that. 

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It just feels very different 
because you're really standing 

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in more of this position of 
agency of being in control. 

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Not like being able to control 
all the things, but being able 

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to make a decision for yourself.
Self based on who you are 

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everything else that's happening
around you rather than feeling 

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like you're being kind of 
dragged all over by all of the 

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different demands and all of the
different things that need your 

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attention. 
So, take a moment, you know, in 

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the coming week, when you start 
to feel yourself being pulled in

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different directions, or you 
start to feel worried about all 

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of the things kind of on your 
plate, take a moment to step 

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back and ask yourself. 
Where is my growth right now? 

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Is this a situation where I need
to give more and just extend you

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know my efforts and you know 
work more hours. 

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Like is that your growth or is 
your growth about? 

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I need to think really 
differently about what this work

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is and about what my job is. 
Maybe your growth is I really 

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need to learn to delegate and to
trust and to communicate with 

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the folks that I feel like You 
know what, I don't really trust 

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them. 
We need to figure out what is 

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going on, so that I can build 
that sense of Reliance that I'll

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be able to hand something to 
them knowing that they'll be 

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able to get it done. 
Sometimes our growth is being 

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okay with other people. 
Doing things not exactly the way

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that we would do it, that can be
so uncomfortable, but sometimes 

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that's where our growth is, 
because if we don't learn how to

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do that, then Then number one, 
we become the bottleneck. 

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Number two, we can turn into 
micromanagers, not because we 

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want to be, but because we're 
not willing to let go of how 

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things are getting done. 
And number three, that can turn 

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us into burnout with no 
boundaries and always feeling 

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like we have to be on and 
available. 

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So that's kind of the idea I 
wanted to share with you in 

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every, you know, week. 
Every moment every situation. 

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You can pause and ask like, what
am I, what am I doing? 

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What, where is my growth here? 
How do I want to be looking at 

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this situation? 
You can also look at it from 

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that lens of what is the most 
valuable problem for me to 

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address? 
Where will I allow for a 

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strategic failure? 
One of my other clients 

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described it as I'm going to 
allow some of the balls to drop 

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because that way we will all 
First and where the weak points 

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are in our processes and 
systems. 

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Like she had been trying so hard
to keep everything together and 

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she began to realize people 
don't understand that. 

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We need to change the way our 
processes and systems are 

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working because I'm able to 
Band-Aid over everything, and 

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I'm able to keep things 
functioning and so we're never 

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really seeing where the systemic
issue is and it was one of the 

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hardest. 
Hardest hardest things for her 

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to do is to allow things to fail
because you know, she's like I 

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don't want anything to fail. 
Especially if it's anything in 

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my hands but when she realized 
that because she was, you know, 

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kind of holding everything 
together all the time, she's 

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like I'll never be able to get 
out of this and we as a team 

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we'll never really see and learn
what we need to be doing 

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differently. 
So, that was her growth. 

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Not Choice around strategic 
failure so that it could 

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illuminate for others, where 
those break points were so that,

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then they could take a real. 
Look at how to repair and 

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improve like the entire like 
system. 

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A good reflection that I wanted 
to offer to you today. 

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The other couple of things I 
wanted to mention is that I 

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right now, I'm running a 
coaching, a group coaching 

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program. 
It's really great. 

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It's small. 
Just a handful of people, all 

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managers. 
And every week we meet and talk 

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about what's going, well, what 
is challenging and what to like,

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how to think about the 
challenges so that you can find 

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a path forward and it's been 
amazing. 

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The conversations are so good. 
Everyone has so much wisdom to 

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share and we've been talking 
about Audrey's and burnout and 

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compensation conversations, both
when you're the one going for a 

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promotion and how to talk about 
that? 

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And also, if it's someone on 
your team coming to, you about 

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wanting to talk about a 
promotion or compensation and 

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like, you know, the challenges 
of that and how to do that. 

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So I'm excited about the next 
group that I offer if you want 

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to be a part of it and you want 
to know when, We going to do 

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this next group, then you need 
to get on my mailing list. 

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Go to my website, canonical.com 
go to the new managers page and 

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at the top of that page you'll 
see the link to join my email 

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list and then you'll know the 
next time I offer it so that you

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can join. 
And we can have these small 

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group conversations about 
managing people being a human 

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dealing with work stuff managing
up. 

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My gosh that also Comes up a 
lot. 

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Not every manager is a 
well-trained manager. 

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Most of us are just making it up
as we go along, and that means 

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your manager also might not have
received training, our guidance,

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and they're doing their best. 
But you know what? 

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If you learned how to manage up,
you might be able to create a 

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much better work experience for 
yourself and for them, but hey, 

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like, let's be here for you. 
So that is what I've got for you

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today. 
Thank you. 

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So much for listening and I will
see you next time. 

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Hey before you go if you like 
this podcast please leave a 

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00:16:20,600 --> 00:16:24,400
review. 
Tell me why you listen and what 

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00:16:24,400 --> 00:16:26,600
has helped you? 
Thanks so much. 

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I'll see you next time.