Work Is My Play: Shauna Stewart on Creativity, Connection & Coming Home to Olympia

Shauna Stewart has returned to lead Experience Olympia & Beyond for the third time — and she'll tell you it's the people who keep pulling her back. In this wide-ranging conversation, Shauna opens up about blending her work as a destination CEO with her practice as an intimacy and relationship coach, why she "hires for delight," how a 2020 health crisis reshaped her identity as a high achiever, and the unexpected healing power of vanilla ice cream. If you've ever confused Olympia with the Olympic Peninsula — she'll set the record straight, and make you want to visit anyway.

Business Class is brought to you by Learn Tourism, the nonprofit academy - harnessing the power of science, business psychology and adult education to advance the tourism industry and build sustainable economies. Learn how to engage your community, win over stakeholders and get more visitors at learntourism.org. 

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:29

Good morning.

SPEAKER_00 0:31

Good morning.

SPEAKER_01 0:32

Oh. I'm Shauna Stewart with Experience Olympia and Beyond. I'm the CEO here.

SPEAKER_00 0:39

What do you love most about Olympia?

SPEAKER_01 0:42

I love the creativity of the people here.

SPEAKER_00 0:45

In what way do you express your own creativity?

SPEAKER_01 0:49

Through work, I have learned that my version of play is work. And that sounds very strange, but it is a fun way for me to be able to be challenged, connect with other people, brainstorm, and put ideas into action in a meaningful way. Work comes from a few different ways. While I'm currently the CEO at Experience Olympia, I also have my own intimacy coaching business as well. And so I play there as well.

SPEAKER_00 1:21

What do you think is the greatest misunderstanding people have about your destination?

SPEAKER_01 1:26

One of the misunderstandings that I hear a lot is that we are the Olympic Peninsula because the word Olympia is very close to Olympic. So it makes sense that that's confusing. We are a great destination to stay overnight in, eat dinner in, explore on your way to the Olympic Peninsula, but we are not, in fact, the rainforest. So there is a beautiful rainforest up on the peninsula of Washington State. We are located right at the South Sound, and we are a capital city as well. And so we do have the reputation that comes with being the seat of politics in our state. And so when our name is presented on television, it can be in the context of some kind of political controversy. And there's just a lot more to here to do than politics.

SPEAKER_00 2:20

Did you grow up in the area?

SPEAKER_01 2:22

I grew up in the area. I've been back and forth a few times, and I've been home since 2015. Built a house about two miles from my parents where I grew up.

SPEAKER_00 2:33

Oh nice.

SPEAKER_01 2:35

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 2:36

In what ways has the community changed for the better since what you remember growing up?

SPEAKER_01 2:42

Yeah, for the better, I think it's been really neat to see how many more options we have in terms of culinary experiences and small businesses that keep popping up. I think that the creativity of the people here is boundless, and that often is manifesting in different types of small businesses in the community. So I think that's been really neat to watch evolve over time.

SPEAKER_00 3:09

What did you study in school?

SPEAKER_01 3:11

I went to school for business administration, minored in psychology, and then I have a master's in public administration with a concentration in nonprofits. So this work has been in my blood for about 20 years now.

SPEAKER_00 3:29

It's pretty impressive. How did you end up finding the destination space?

SPEAKER_01 3:33

I had taken a nonprofit marketing class in college, and so that was something that I really wanted to do. I thought I would be saving women and children. And I went into networking mode the summer after I graduated. And when I went to go buy shoes to work at Starbucks for my summer job, the shopkeeper handed me some business cards to the Downtown Alliance and the Chamber of Commerce and encouraged me to get involved there. That was not my idea of nonprofit marketing that I thought I would be doing. I ended up getting an interview through those volunteer opportunities for the Destination Marketing Organization. So it was 20 years ago. I was back living with my parents, and we live kind of out in the woods. So our internet connection wasn't great. And the DMO had those flash websites at the time that loaded really slow. So I had no idea what the job was that I was interviewing for outside of the job description. I could do no research on it. But fortunately, I think the volunteer support had helped me earn some street cred with the community, and some people gave some nice references for me. So I actually started with Experience Olympia 20 years ago. This is my third time with the organization. I started there. It was my first big girl job out of college. And then I went on to another DMO, did some other things, came back in 2015, was the CEO from 2015 to 2020, got sick in 2020, had to leave, and then came back in December. So it's just like one of those relationships that I can't walk away from for too long.

SPEAKER_00 5:22

What has been your greatest day at work?

SPEAKER_01 5:25

I think most recently it was sitting around the team meeting and recognizing how beautiful each and every person around that table was. And knowing that for whatever reason, they have chosen to be a part of this team. And they are trading their time and their talent to be a part of this particular organization to contribute to the community in a meaningful way. And I just feel so dang proud of the people who have decided to raise their hand and show up. I came back as interim. I wasn't planning on staying permanently, but it was looking around the table at them and being like, nope, I need to stay. This is this is an incredible team, and we can do some really cool things together.

SPEAKER_00 6:18

What are a couple of the biggest challenges your organization is facing now?

SPEAKER_01 6:24

I think budget's always a challenge for us. When I left, our budget is pretty much the same as it was when I left in 2020, which means that it's actually less in terms of buying power because of inflation and so forth. The cities have a lot of competing needs for the tourism funds. There's a lot of important organizations and needs in our community to fund. Another challenge is that we are a regional organization. And so really trying to make sure that we are telling the stories of each individual community in a way that resonates and feels true, and also connects with the visitors who really don't see the lines that divide each community. Yeah, being able to kind of tell the story of this whole region that ranges from wildly creative and kind of like more hippie culture to political, being the political seat to having this rich historic history as being one of the first settlements in Washington state to rural farming and agriculture and parks and recreation and so forth. So it's a really broad geographic area with very different stories to tell. I think that there's threads that connect us.

SPEAKER_00 7:50

What do you think is one of those common threads?

SPEAKER_01 7:53

I think we're a fiercely passionate bunch. We're either fiercely passionate about our art, we're fiercely passionate about our farming, and we are a very opinionated bunch. We lead with our hearts and our opinions, and that is beautiful in so many ways, and it clashes sometimes in ways. And I think that that's all part of the dance.

SPEAKER_00 8:20

If you weren't doing this, what would you be doing now?

SPEAKER_01 8:25

Well, I'd probably be full-time in my other business, which is intimacy coaching, relationship coaching. That's a field I got into in 2020. And while they seem very different, intimacy coaching, relationship coaching, and destination marketing, I think at the end of the day, the big question that drives me is what helps people feel most alive. And I believe that travel is one of those things that helps us come alive in our relationships and our bodies and our experiences just by stepping out of the everyday, the mundane, and being able to learn something new. And then from an intimacy and relationship perspective, I think that when we change our relationship with our own bodies, when we understand what really lights us up and turns us on and how to be in relationship with other people in a healthy and consensual way, that helps us also become more alive, more turned on, and just more present in our everyday lives.

SPEAKER_00 9:31

When do you find yourself most present?

SPEAKER_01 9:34

Travel definitely helps us, me feel more present. I say us because my husband and I were just reflecting on this when we were in Paris recently, and just how being in Paris, like we were complete, it was just the two of us. We were completely consumed in every single moment, whether it was the wine tasting or a show we were watching, we were just right there and there was nothing else in the world that mattered. And I think that travel, I mean, I I love camping. That's another form of travel, helps do that. But being in relationship with others in this shared experience, like travel.

SPEAKER_00 10:15

What advice would you have for your 20-year-old self?

SPEAKER_01 10:18

I think the advice I would have for my 20-year-old self is to remember that work doesn't define you. I think in 2020, when I got sick, it was a reckoning with a lot of my value systems. And I had identified as a high achiever up until that point. And while I still love winning, achieving, doing big things, and creating things, I no longer identify with being a high achiever in a way that achievement creates my worth or my identity. And so I think that you can have a lot of fun achieving, have a lot of fun creating. It doesn't necessarily define you. It's not necessarily your identity, and it's not necessarily your worth. Those things come from other places.

SPEAKER_00 11:06

I was one of those high achievers in my 20s as well. Had that little chip on the shoulder that I had to accomplish X, Y, and Z by the time I turned 30 or 35.

SPEAKER_01 11:15

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 11:15

In retrospect, you are your values. You are the values that you demonstrate day in and day out.

SPEAKER_01 11:22

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 11:23

What's most valuable to you?

SPEAKER_01 11:25

I think just like loving people, I'm learning more and more every day what that means. I think that I've had a very conceptual, like neck up concept of what love meant. And I think I was striving for love in a lot of ways. I think that over the last five, six years, I'm slowly understanding what that means and how to love myself unconditionally, love my kids unconditionally, and loving outside of the context of like what we were just talking about, outside of what we do and outside of having to earn it.

SPEAKER_00 12:04

As you look around your office or the space that you're in today, what's one item that stands out to you and why?

SPEAKER_01 12:12

Well, that's embarrassing because I haven't quite moved into my office. I guess what I will say, this is a goofy answer to that, but I have my sunglasses on my table. And usually I took them off right before I recorded. Usually they're on my head, and I'm always just prepared for the sun. Living here in the Pacific Northwest, we don't always get the sun. And so I just always feel like I need to be prepared for it. And I feel like maybe it helps manifest it as well.

SPEAKER_00 12:47

So that's funny. Are you are you a beach person, a mountain person?

SPEAKER_01 12:52

I love the mountains. I feel really good living in I live in the woods. Going up to the mountains or being in the forest near near water of some kind is lovely. But I definitely love being in the woods among the trees.

SPEAKER_00 13:08

What's the secret secret to forming a strong team at work?

SPEAKER_01 13:14

Yeah. What is the secret? I think it's finding the right people who really genuinely care and figuring out how to support them really well. I love to be able to cast a vision and then stand back and support the team in helping them create their version of that vision in their own job roles and seeing how they interpret it, how they bring their energy and their imagination to it. Usually their ideas are far better than anything that I could come up with. And so it's really fun to, I think like giving them space to be their best selves and then supporting them along the way. There's always going to be bumps in the road or trouble, or they need more resources or information or training or something. And so being able to provide that for them is helpful. And then I also think when I say hiring the right people, the word that always comes up in every interview is reminding myself to hire for delight, because anybody can post on social media, anybody can write good content for a visitor guide anymore, especially with AI at our fingertips, who's going to be the person or the people I'm going to like light up and want to stand up and go chat with when they walk in the door, or I'm going to be excited to see when they come to my door. And I think that delight element has served me really well over 20 years of hiring people. And it's been a really a big honor who chooses, like I said, to trade their time and energy to be a part of teams like that. And I think a big part of that is because they find joy in what they're doing. Okay.

SPEAKER_00 15:51

You have to find joy in what you do.

SPEAKER_01 15:53

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 15:55

You have to do it with kindness.

SPEAKER_01 15:57

Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 15:58

And you have to do it with a want to learn. And that's, you know, that sort of echoes a lot of the same things that you're talking about.

SPEAKER_01 16:04

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 16:05

With your team. What's something you'd like to learn this year?

SPEAKER_01 16:08

I've been back in this role for about six months. I was on a nine-month contract. So six months. And for the first part of it, I didn't think I was going to be sticking around. Like I said, I kind of accidentally fell in love with the team, back in love with the community, the work, the industry, and so forth. So I was doing what I needed to get done on a temporary basis. I think what I'm looking forward to right now is reconnecting with the industry on a deeper level and really understanding how it's evolved over the last five years. I feels a little bit like being in a time warp because I'm coming back to the same organization, same industry. And of course, there's a lot of the same players in place, but some have shifted, some have changed. And while a lot of the language and the foundations are the same, there's been a lot of things that have changed as well. And so just trying to catch up on what those changes are and how I can lead this organization forward in a modern and sustainable way.

SPEAKER_00 17:12

There's that old phrase, as much as things change, they stay the same. What do you think is one of the things that will stay the same even as technology changes so much of what we do and how we connect with others?

SPEAKER_01 17:28

I think it's going to be a desire for connection. It's one of the most beautiful things, I think, about this industry in particular, the tourism industry, having stepped out of it and been in different industries over the last five years. It's something very special about this industry, is our the people who are drawn to this work are drawn to connection. And it is one of those fields where we go to these conferences or you meet other competitor destinations and they quickly become your best friends and your biggest allies and supporters. And you can text them, you can call them in your darkest hour of need, they will be there for you. And I think that humanity is desperate for humanity right now. And I think that travel attracts people who are passionate, I think, about humanity in general. So I think we're gonna be wanting to cultivate that through relationships, through connection. You use the word kindness, but by being good to each other.

SPEAKER_00 18:35

What did I not ask that you wish I did?

SPEAKER_01 18:39

Why I keep coming back?

SPEAKER_00 18:41

That's a good question. Why do you?

SPEAKER_01 18:44

I mean, maybe I answered it already, but again, it's like the people, the team, the people in our community. It was really wild coming back and seeing how much support there was and how those relationships, even after five years of zero cultivation, picked up right where they left off. And I think that we are in a unique position in humanity and culture right now, where we're in the Wild West, where we have AI, we're in a very kind of dark and strange geopolitical climate. And I think that it is going to be up to us in the small communities to decide how our world looks and how we shape it moving forward. And so what was particularly compelling to me as well is being able to work alongside our great team, my colleagues in the community to decide how our community wants to look in the next five, 10 years? How do we want to work together? Is current culture working? Or are there massive cultural shifts that need to start happening so we can solve the problems and challenges of our communities moving forward? What needs to be done to do that? And I think that it's very interesting and exciting for me to be a part of that, part of those conversations and shaping those. And then also just bringing in what I've learned about the human condition and about our hopes, dreams, desires, and what makes us tick from intimacy coaching and layering that into community leadership is going to be an interesting adventure, I think. What makes you feel most alive?

SPEAKER_00 20:35

I'm a nerd.

SPEAKER_01 20:36

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 20:36

I love to learn.

SPEAKER_01 20:37

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 20:38

No matter what it is that I'm doing, if I'm learning something while I'm doing it, I'm happy as a clam.

SPEAKER_01 20:44

What have you learned lately that has really struck you or changed your beingness?

SPEAKER_00 20:52

My 14-year-old niece, who has pretty much spent her summers with me since she was four, is now with me full-time. So that is a different scale of parenting because we're also traveling. So we're traveling, we're living together, she's in school, I'm responsible for her curriculum. It's a there are a lot of layers there.

SPEAKER_01 21:15

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 21:15

And learning how to balance that while still being the kind and supportive and loving person that I want to be. That's been something I practice.

SPEAKER_01 21:30

Yeah. Being in relationship with others is like one of the fastest ways to show you your stuff.

SPEAKER_00 21:38

Yes. It's not going to grow. Yeah, you will grow or you'll collapse. But we we have ice cream at the ready in case it's been a rough day.

SPEAKER_01 21:50

Yeah, good. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 21:52

What is your go-to cheat food?

SPEAKER_01 21:57

Oh, cheat food. I don't know that I believe in cheap foods. I allow myself, I just I think that it's all nutritious in one way or another. I'm either giving myself nutrition with actual macros or with joy. But I will say, speaking of ice cream, when I was very sick, I started having these very strange fantasies about ice cream Sundays. And I'd never really been an ice cream person. And I had a whole host of symptoms that were largely caused by inflammation. And so I was trying to avoid dairy and sugar as much as possible. But eventually the fantasies got so strong and there were no other answers for why I was sick. And I asked my doctor if I could have them have ice cream after losing 20 pounds. And she said, just go eat. And I went and had a big, huge Sunday with like the whipped cream, chocolate, nuts, sprinkles, all the things. And I actually, for the first time in six months, felt better the next day, which was wild because sugar and dairy are both very inflammatory. And then I was like, that's strange. And then over the next few months, every time I ate vanilla ice cream with whipping cream, I would feel better for like a day or two. And I told my doctors, I was just like, I'm eat, I'm self-medicating with ice cream right now. And they're like, we don't understand it, but keep doing it. We'll come to find out years later. Harvard's actually done some studies on ice cream, and they say that people who are eating vanilla ice cream in particular, like one to two days a week, actually have higher overall health markers, and they're correlating that. There's something in the way the fat and the sugar kind of compounds, but also it triggers all your internal pharmacy of hormones related to endorphins, dopamine, and it's connected to nostalgia. And so it's actually the joy and the pleasure that's helping you feel good and heal. And so I think that was a fascinating little tidbit. Like last night I wasn't feeling very well, and we just keep vanilla ice cream on hand now. It's not something I usually go for, but when I'm feeling not great, I give myself some vanilla ice cream, and then the next day I'm back at it.

SPEAKER_00 24:19

I love it. If folks want to play the visit to your area, where would they go to learn more?

SPEAKER_01 24:25

Experienceolympia.com would be the best place.

SPEAKER_00 24:28

Any parting thoughts?

SPEAKER_01 24:30

I just think that the work that we are doing as destinations is really important to shaping our future as a culture and being able to exchange ideas and connect with people who are outside our own little world and circles is so profound and beautiful. And so just encouraging people to keep doing the good work, even when it's hard. And I'm looking forward to meeting more people at industry events as well.

SPEAKER_00 25:01

Thank you so much for your time. This has been a delight.

SPEAKER_01 25:04

Thank you. Same.

SPEAKER_00 25:06

And I'll feel better when I have a cup of ice cream later.

SPEAKER_01 25:08

Yeah. Yeah. And guilt free, right? No?

SPEAKER_00 25:12

Yeah, absolutely. No guilt at all. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 25:14

Good, good.

SPEAKER_00 25:15

For your time.

SPEAKER_01 25:16

Take care. Bye.

SPEAKER_00 25:17

Take care.