E51
[00:00:00] Welcome back to the upgraded CEO podcast. I'm your host Nicole Case, and I'm excited to welcome you back to this podcast with a refresh name for season two. And so first things first. Why? Why the rebrand? Why the new name? Well, leadership evolves You evolve. I'm sure, I'm sure you're not the same person you were last year or five years ago.
Right. And I know I certainly am not. So, I'm so excited to talk to you about kind of the, this not a new direction, right? But a just refined direction, if you will, a clar clarity if you will, on, on this podcast. So if you're new here. Hi. Hello. Welcome. So glad that you're here. Um, I have been working in. Hr, human resources in tech and pharmaceutical companies for the last 15 years.
And I started my coaching and consulting business back in 2018, and that's where I really focused my, my [00:01:00] business, right? 'cause that's what I knew was, was the corporate space. So I was executive coach and still an executive coach for badass women corporate leaders. And as I was building my business and getting, getting more into the entrepreneur space, I was finding that the conversations that I was having with my entrepreneur friends were very, very similar to the conversations I was having with my corporate clients.
Right. You know, we're building teams. How do I get my team to show up and take ownership and accountability for their work? You know, how do I ensure that. You know, there's high standards, but yet I don't have to be in the weeds and the bottleneck for everything. You know, how do I have a life outside of my business or outside of my career?
I want a full life. So all of these conversations that I've been having, I mean, having them with both populations of people. And so I realized that regardless of if we are. Women who are running our own businesses, building our own empires over here, or we're doing it inside of a [00:02:00] company. We are all CEOs, right?
We are the CEOs of our lives and our businesses, and this podcast is meant to reflect that. So you're gonna hear bold conversations, leadership strategy, mindset shift, real tools. Conversations that I'm, again, you're gonna be able to listen into on conversations that I'm having both with my clients and my friends.
And yeah, that's what we're gonna talk about here. So I'm so glad that you're here. Um, all of the things that we've talked about in past seasons still are still valid. That still makes sense, and they're still there for you to go back and listen to all 50 episodes. If you wanna go back and binge some of those, those are there for you as well.
So why does, why this idea of an upgraded CEO, why does that matter? Well, if you're like me, you've probably built your career or your business. You've built your success off of your back of hustling your face off. Right? I know. [00:03:00] I don't know if it's you, but I grew up with a dad and a family that really valued.
Work ethic, working hard, you know, showing up. And even still my business, my, my parents are business owners now. Um, they weren't, my parents have always been business owners. Right. Um, 'cause that's what they needed to do in order to put food on the table. They always had a side hustle. They always had a side thing going in order to, you know, sustain us as a family.
Um, which I super appreciate. And then once my sister and I were older and outta the house, they took the, the big leap and went full time into an excavating business. And still to this day, my dad's like. Coley, if I'm not working, I'm not making money. And so it took me a really long time to untangle that belief and that mindset that working harder equates more success or working harder Equates.
To more money because that's just not true. It's not true in corporate as we know that the people who work the hardest, the people who were there, you know, the first people in the last people out that worked [00:04:00] through their lunch break, you know, those are not necessarily the people that get the promotion.
In fact, you probably aren't the person who's getting the promotion if you're working yourself in that way. And that's same. That's the same in our business. As well. So you've built success, but it has come at a cost. It's come at the cost of your time, your energy, and probably at a place now where your ability to really zoom out and think bigger and more strategically.
If you've ever been somebody, particularly in corporate who's ever been told, you're not strategic enough, this is probably one of the reasons, um, is because you're just so down into the weeds, you're not able to, if you feel like you're stuck at a plateau in your business. This is probably why, because you're just so down in the weeds.
And you're depleting your time and energy firefighting all the time, right? So we need an upgrade. We need to upgrade to the true CEO of our business, our careers, and our lives. And we're gonna do it on purpose, right? We're gonna do it on purpose. So again, whether you are running your own business, leading a division or a department.
Yeah, [00:05:00] the pressure to do it all yourself is real, right? Because, because once again, there's a, society has told us that like there's this value in DIYing it, you know, doing it all yourself, you know, if you ever wanna get something done right, you gotta do it yourself. And upgrade isn't about doing more, it's about leading differently.
It's about. It's about empowering your team to, and developing them to also be the CEOs of their own careers and their lives, and this unlocks a level of freedom for yourself where you're able to drive impact, you're able to, you know, just, just do so much more and impact things on such a bigger scale than again, holding onto all of these things and keeping it.
Keeping it just for yourself. So again, if you are in a place right now where you're like, man, I'm feeling kind of stuck. You're constantly in reaction mode. You don't feel like you're being very strategic right now. You're just, you know, your team relies on [00:06:00] you for everything, whether it's decisions, approvals, fire drills, all the things, and you find that your calendar is packed with things that feel urgent but aren't truly important.
Then you know that you're meant for more. You know that. That's not how you want to continue operating. You know that you're gonna stay stuck right where you are if we don't figure this out. But the how of that feels out of reach, the how of, how do I upgrade myself to that next level feels really hard.
And that's what I'm here for. I'm here to gonna share all those things, share, share how we can be that upgraded, CEO together. So what does it mean to be an upgraded CEO? Well, again, these aren't just titles, you know, maybe you're the CEO of of a business, which is super cool if you are. I'm CEO of my business.
But this is more about traits, about characteristics of women who stand up and lead with power, lead with clarity, lead with [00:07:00] intention, who lead with ease, and with fun, right? How dare we, how dare we wanna have fun in our, in our careers and our business and our lives. So first and foremost, an upgraded CEO leads with clarity and vision.
You know where you're gonna go, you know where you're going and why. And even if in this current moment you're feeling super stuck, you know that you're gonna, I'm gonna pause, I'm gonna reassess, I'm gonna do some reflection. I'm gonna go back to my values 'cause I know what my values are. That's a piece of clarity that, that you definitely have.
And so then you're able to make. Really informed intentional decisions and be able to move forward then with that clarity and vision, and, and so then, and then you're able to articulate that to others. You're able to share that with your team. You're able to share that with your partners, with your spouses, with your family and friends, so they, they know where you're going and why, and so they can decide if they wanna get on board too.
And [00:08:00] you aren't just getting things done, you're focusing on the right things that move your company or your career. Forward and your calendar reflects that. I've been having a lot of conversations with private clients lately on, on this. Like literally we are, they're sharing their screen and they're showing me their jam packed calendars that they're just back to back to back and they know they're, they're exhausted because one, we only have so many much time in the day, but also too.
They're exhausted because they're spending their energy in meetings and in conversations that they don't need to be in, or it's not the right ones that they either need to delegate that to a team member, or gosh, automate that or something. They are not working on the right things right now. So sometimes we need to stop and get clarity on, Hey, what should I be focused on?
So that, again, your calendar, your goals, your energy is aligned to that vision that you have set. The second characteristic of an upgraded CEO is that they empower [00:09:00] others to lead. So you have experienced so much success in your career. First and foremost, you're gonna turn around and you are going to pull people up with you.
You're sending the elevator back down, if you will, because again, you've gotten to this immense place of success. And you know that you are not gonna stop. It's not gonna stop with you. You're gonna turn around and you're gonna grow, and you're gonna develop the next generation, the next people, and you're not gonna be the bottleneck.
You're not gonna be the bottleneck to getting work done because everything needs to go through you and you're not gonna be the bottleneck for some somebody else's success either. So you start to build leadership around you. This is how we amplify our vision, our mission. What we are doing here in this world is that we help.
And build others up so they can help support in all of this. And none of that can happen if you don't trust your team or your direct reports to, to solve their own [00:10:00] problems, to make decisions, to take ownership. Right. That's probably the biggest conversation that I have with my. With my business owner and my, um, and with my corporate clients is how do I get, how do I build a team that takes ownership so that I don't have to like constantly nag them?
That was a conversation I had last week. She's like, I don't wanna I with a client. She's like, I feel like I'm just nagging my team all the time, and nobody wants that, right? Like nobody wants to. To operate in that way, right? So we need to build our team and give them the resources and the support and the clarity and the expectations that they need so that they can take ownership.
We, and so first and foremost, we have to trust them and we have to let them. We have to let them take ownership. And if you are continuing to be in this go-to position, or you're continuing to be in this, um, in this space where again, everything bottlenecks through you, it's never gonna happen. So [00:11:00] you are no longer the go-to for everything.
An upgraded CEO is not the go-to person. You have hired that person. You hire the new go-to. Right? And that's gonna be, and that's a good thing. The next characteristic of an upgraded CEO is that you set boundaries that protect your energy. You are no longer saying yes out of guilt or fear. You know, this is, this is such a turning point.
I love when I get to this place with private clients because they get to this place where they're, they finally like realize that like, oh, I am in charge. I do get to set the rules. I do get to set, set the boundaries and the expectations because like so often, like, well. Why do you have that meeting at that time?
Why don't we move it? Well, I can't do that. Well, why not? You're the freaking, you know, head of this department reporting directly you're a Csuite leader. Why? Why not? Or you, you own this business. This is your business. Why can't you decide? Like you get to decide and. So you are [00:12:00] setting the boundaries that protect your energy.
Like you are not saying yes to things that you don't wanna say yes to, and you are defining what is yours to own and what's not. Like this is, I'm gonna own this decision. I'm gonna own this part. And the rest of it that you are going to delegate or you're gonna delete, you know, all of those things.
You're gonna pass that off to other, other people in the business or other people in your company that. They need to take care of that, or they need to own that piece, which leads you to be able to lead from a place of intention, not depletion. I think we are often just running a million miles a minute and we are in such reaction mode.
Upgraded CEOs do not operate in reaction mode. Now let's be clear. There are certainly. Roles, there are certainly business models that, um, are a little bit more reactive, like, you know, you're, you're waiting for income or inbound sort of stuff, and that's [00:13:00] okay. But again, the decisions that you're making, the SOPs that you're creating, the processes that you're creating, the team that you're building, you're doing that from a place of intention and grounding.
Not a place of depletion, not a place of knee jerk reactions. Right. And especially in the, in the environment that we're in right now, everything feels like a firefight. Everything feels like a fire drill. But upgraded CEOs, they're able to. Get out all of that noise. They're able to to close out all of that noise.
Which leads me to the next, um, the fourth characteristic of an upgraded CEO. You run the show, you are running the show without running yourself into the ground. Because once again, like back to what I said before, it is not sustainable for you to be running a million miles a minute. 24 7. It's just not sustainable.
There are certainly seasons for that, right? Whenever you're in a push season or you're in a sprint or something like that, yeah, there's definitely [00:14:00] cycles and seasons where, where things are are, or things are intense in that way, but that is not sustainable. You know? It's not sustainable. You're not, you are not operating as if that is.
The everyday way to run your business or to, or to run your team, right, or to run your life in general. So you have created the systems, the structure, and the communication to do the heavy lifting around all of this, not just your individual effort because yes. Running a business, leading a team, being a corporate badass requires effort.
It certainly does. It requires effort, but it does not require exhaustion because if it did, then. You're gonna get so burnt to a crisp and get burnt out, and then you're gonna hit rock bottom And good grief. Can we, how many, how many of us have heard or spoken to people who have quote unquote hit rock bottom, have had some crazy medical situation come up due to stress or overwork or whatever?
And [00:15:00] it's like, can we, how about as an upgraded CEOs? We don't wait until we get to rock bottom, or we don't wait until we have a major issue in our relationships. To make a change, right? We do that now. We are intentional and we do that now because you've built a sustainable way of working that does not depend on your constant involvement, does not depend on your constant, you know, you know, responses to everything you've built, systems and processes in place that your team can take a hold of a lot of that.
Or even if you don't have a team yet, there's some sort of an automation or decision matrix that takes a lot of that, um, a lot of that active effort off the table. So that you're able to have time to think, not just react because that's what you're being paid for, right? You're being paid probably not in how many widgets can I build as an individual?
Maybe your team, I don't know. Maybe your team's, you know, building widgets [00:16:00] or building doodads or something. But that's not what they're paying you to do as a CEO, not as a CEO of your business, not as a CEO of your department. They're paying you to think. They're paying you for your brain. We are in a world of knowledge workers.
That's where we are. I had a client I was working with recently, she's an SVP at a major pharmaceutical company, you know, responsible for $40 million worth of worth of business. And when she got this promotion to the SVP, she was like, Nicole. I don't have a lot of things on my calendar. And I was like, okay, great.
And she's like, what do I do then? Because she was just so, like, my team is in these meetings now, like I'm not in them. I'm not in charge of these things anymore. You know, they're bringing me in for escalations and for and for very specific things, but what do I do now? Right? And it's like, well, what are you being paid to [00:17:00] do?
So think about that. What are you being paid to do as the CEO of your business, as the CEO of your team? What are you being paid to do? What is your, what are you actually here for? And I told her, I was like, your value is not wrapped up into how many meetings that you're in. And I think that that's something that we for a long time prided ourselves on that We're like, oh, look at all these meetings.
I'm needed. People want my perspective. You know, I'm leading things, I'm running things. No, you're running yourself ragged. So your value is not in your, and how many meetings do you have on your calendar? How many emails are in your inbox? It's how are you able to. Problem solve, think critically about issues.
A upgraded CEO knows which problems to solve and when and how to build the team around going and tackling that problem. 'cause there's all kinds of problems out there that we could solve. All kinds of problems. No, not a shortage of problems. Right. But as leaders, [00:18:00] as upgraded CEOs, we need to discern which of those we're going to we're gonna solve and we can't.
Do any of that if we don't have the space to actually think about those problems, right, and, and not just react to them. Right. And finally. The fifth characteristic of an upgraded CEO is someone who does not avoid hard conversations. Right. I had a amazing conversation with a private client this past week, and we got on the call and I was like, how are you doing?
What's going on? And she's leading an, an enormous initiative at, um, a different large pharmaceutical company, and she's, you know, this big transformational project and she's like. I have just decided that I was hired to do a difficult job that people are not going to be happy about. I'm making very unpopular decisions [00:19:00] and having really difficult conversations with people, and I'm gonna own that, and that doesn't mean that she has to be a bitch.
That doesn't mean that she has to be mean and rude because she's the, that's the last person that she is. Believe me, that's the last person she is. But she's just owning the fact that like, Hey, I have to have difficult conversations with people. I'm talking to people about their budgets. I'm talking to people about their productivity and I'm talking to people about, you know, some really sensitive type of type of things, right?
That can put people on the defensive. She's like, I'm gonna, I'm gonna make people uncomfortable here, but that's what I've been hired to do and that's okay. And. And once again, she can do that and communicate that in ways that that's super authentic to her. And we've been working on that, that, you know, how do we, how do we have these conversations and navigate these difficult conversations in a way that feels good to her?
Well, also driving the business impact, right? So. As an upgraded CEO, you don't avoid those hard conversations. You are leaning into feedback. You are recognizing that conflict isn't [00:20:00] always bad. That by having some conflict, you're pulling out, you know, the hidden issues and challenges and implications that maybe you haven't thought of, and getting people to the table to talk about them, right?
So we can solve that conflict, whatever it is, and then move forward. And you are having those conversations about accountability, but you're doing it with clarity and compassion and empathy for the people around you, for your team, and for your colleagues, and you handle these challenges head on because you know that that's where the growth is, right?
The growth is not in your, you know, as they say, the growth is not in your comfort zone. The growth is. When you step out of that comfort zone, whenever you tackle those things, head, head on. And believe me, whenever you tackle those things head on, oh my gosh, it gets so much easier. And oh my gosh, wow, that was, that was probably a lot worse built up in my head than what it actually was.
And you lead with truth. You lead with truth even when it's uncomfortable. And so that [00:21:00] means even if you have an employee who's just struggling, who's not working out, maybe isn't the, isn't the right fit. You lead with that truth and you have that difficult conversation with them, even though it might be uncomfortable, who is it really uncomfortable for?
Is it uncomfortable for you or is it actually uncomfortable for them? Are you actually trying to save their feelings? Or are you actually trying to save your own, because this is an awkward conversation for you. I was, um, chatting with, um, a different client and she's, uh, on Friday and she was saying about how she's, she's new to this role.
We've been, we'd been working for a couple of months to get her an upgraded role. And so she got a big promotion, moved to a different firm, and she's like, uh, I don't think this is, I don't think this is the fit for me. And she like, laid out all the reasons why she doesn't think it's the fit. And she's been there six months and, and I was like, okay.
That's our, she was kind of feeling bad about it. Right. And I was like, it's okay though. Like if it's not the right fit, I bet there is someone out there who would be tickled pink to have your position and would, would thrive in it and would love it. [00:22:00] So let's make space for that for them. Right? So that is her truth.
She's just, it's just not the right fit. Sometimes as, as upgraded CEOs, we have to have that conversation with our employees too. So either it's not a right fit and we need to help help them move on to a fit that that is better. Or we, we adjust things or support them in elevating them where they are so that it is a better fit.
But regardless, we can't sweep them under the rug. Right? As upgraded CEOs, we tackle it head on because the more we let it go, the the more it's gonna fester and the worse it's gonna be, and the harder it's gonna be to correct. The longer that we let things go and. If you know anything about me, I do not believe that reasonable, rational, healthy adults come to work to do bad work on purpose.
They just don't. They don't, and so if they are struggling, we as upgraded CEOs need to first look at ourselves to see what is it that we need to do to [00:23:00] help support them. Again, sometimes the answer is, we need to adjust some things. We need to get them more training, more resources, whatever. There's lots of things in different con, you know, separate podcast episode that we could do to help support them.
Or it might just be, you know what, this is not the right fit for you either, it never was, or it's no longer the right fit and, and we need to help you move on to the next place where you can do amazing, awesome work. Because again, I believe that everybody is capable of that. So that's what it means to be an upgraded CEO. So I'd love to hear from you like what would happen if you truly stepped into your upgraded CEO role. What would change in your calendar? What would change in your team? What would change in your energy this week? If you fully stepped into that upgraded CEO role?
I'd love to hear from you. Send me a DM either on Instagram or on LinkedIn. And if you really love this episode, and if you really [00:24:00] loved this kind of reflection and journal prompt that I just gave you, you would also love to be inside of my new community, the upgraded CEO circle. This is a free leadership community for women just like you who are leading with more clarity, power, and freedom, and ease.
And, um, every week I drop in a new journal prompt or reflection prompt, just like this one every week into the community. We're in there sharing our favorite podcasts, our favorite books that we're reading right now. And I don't know about you, but I can always use a new, book or podcast to be listening to, even though my TBR and to to be read is miles high right now.
And I also have monthly, um, CEO power moves, mini trainings in there, and all of my free trainings, all of my free guides and downloads, all of that is inside of the upgraded CEO circle. So I invite you into that. I will put a link in the show notes and in the comments. Um, section [00:25:00] below here so you can, um, get, get inside of there.
So I'm so excited to be back, excited to be dropping some more episodes really soon. So I will see you next time. And remember, your career deserves an upgrade.
