166: Resilience Is Motion, Not Stillness, with Kenyada Meadows

Balance isn’t the finish line. It's the pendulum that’s almost never centered, the butterfly that needs resistance to fly, and the swimmer who learns to win with water in his goggles.

We sat down with coach, author, and financial services executive Kenyada Meadows to rethink resilience through values, emotional integrity, and the power of community. From a career on Wall Street to the Harvard Advanced Management Program, Kenyada traces a shift from “go it alone” leadership to a world where being world-class means belonging to a circle that challenges you, backs you, and understands the real costs of change.

We dig into truths about identity at work—why your title can’t hold your worth—and how a strong sense of justice and family roots can steady you when corporate culture pushes conformity. We talk about trading camouflage for vulnerability, asking direct questions about how you’re showing up, and choosing which battles are worth your time when you zoom out five or fifty years. 

Kenyada also shares what’s next for him: coaching at Executive Parent Company, his book The New Alpha, the Executive Dad podcast, and a forthcoming exploration of followership that flips the usual leadership script.

Connect with Kenyada on LinkedIn.

If you’re ready to lead with your whole self—and stop confusing motion with progress—this conversation offers clear language, practical steps, and a humane path forward. Listen and share it with someone who needs it.

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Transcript

Opening On Dynamic Balance

Kenyada Meadows 0:01

Balance is a dynamic and ongoing and sustainable activity, not just a condition that we should expect to maintain or to sit in indefinitely, right? And so struggle is going to be a part of that.

Meet Kenyada Meadows

Manya Chylinski 0:20

Hello and welcome to Notes on Resilience. I'm your host, Manya Chylinski. My guest today is Kenyada Meadows. He's a coach, author, financial services executive, a governance expert, and he helps working fathers and executives succeed without sacrificing their humanity. Today we talked about leadership, emotional integrity, how to be a values-driven leader. I think you're really going to enjoy this conversation. I know I did. Kenyada, I'm so glad we're talking today. Thank you for being here.

The “Enemy’s Book Title” Icebreaker

Kenyada Meadows 0:54

Absolutely. Thank you for having me.

Manya Chylinski 0:56

First question out of the box. What would the title of a book be about you if your worst enemy wrote it?

Kenyada Meadows 1:05

He's often right, but I hate him anyway. You know, I don't know. I think that would, I think that probably would sum it up. I think anyone who doesn't like me probably doesn't like me because they think um, it's not because they think I'm reckless or because they think I'm thoughtless or because they think I'm dishonest. I think it's actually the contrary. Sometimes I'm I'm a little bit um too straightforward, but I I think not too straightforward for my taste, and it's not tactless or anything like that, but it's just I call things out that I think people would rather be left unsaid or unseen. And that's just not how I how I operate. So even though, of course, I'm not always right, my logic is usually sound and there's enough rightness in there to at least be confusing to me. So yeah, I think I think it would be something like that.

Manya Chylinski 1:58

All right. I would read that book. I would want to find out what this person is thinking. Every time I ask this question, I think it's so hard to think about who doesn't like us and why wouldn't they like us? So I like that you kind of thought about what would be the thinking of someone who isn't as enamored of you as your friends are.

Kenyada Meadows 2:19

Yeah, I'm pretty clear. I'm pretty clear about who don't who, you know, the people who don't like me. Um, and they tend to be in one specific context. And the people who really love me and respect or admire me, they they tend to do it for the same reasons um that the people who don't like me don't like me, right? So I think, I think, yeah, it has something to do with me, undoubtedly, but I think it has a lot to do with them as well and how they feel about what is either true or perceived to be true, or the way they want to engage about what could be true or their own perspectives. You know, I think it's a certain personality type and a certain context. So yeah, I don't like to dwell on it or think about it, but I think I'm pretty clear on who those people might be or where they might where they might reside in my in the landscape of my life.

Knowing Who Dislikes You And Why

Manya Chylinski 3:04

Right, right. All right. Well, thank you for sharing that and um being so honest about where that comes from. So as we're talking here on notes on resilience, um, everyone's had a moment in their life that changes how they think about leading or how they think about taking care of other people. What is one of those moments for you?

Pivotal Shift At Harvard AMP

Redefining World Class Through Community

Values Inside Corporate Finance

Kenyada Meadows 3:27

It's a good question. I mean, I think there have been a number of moments, certainly throughout life, that have been formative and additive. I would say in the more recent past, in the last few years, let's say, one pivotal point was doing the advanced management program at Harvard. And I think the first thing I would say is you go to that program normally if you're already seeking something, if you're already trying to figure out what else life has to offer, what else you have to offer life and those around you, your community, your society, um, how you want to build a legacy, you know, just what you want to learn, who you want to meet. There is an openness there, but more than just openness, there tends to be a yearning. So for me, that was a pivotal point, but but I make reference to what kind of gets you there to give credence to, or at least to acknowledge, the other points that kind of came before that point, right? Um, it's not like I fell uh off the back of a truck and and and there I was on Harvard's campus. But I think that was really, really informative in terms of getting perspectives from other leaders uh from around the world, um, having to engage with them and learn their ways and having them learn mine, seeing some of the things that worked, some of the dynamics that did not work, and the education and certainly the engagement with the professors, which was absolutely uh fabulous. But I think leadership for me, one of the major takeaways for me from that, and maybe this is probably going to be one of your follow-up questions, so I'll just jump right in anyway. And this isn't something that was necessarily spelled out or taught at the program, but for me, what I realized is that to be world class does not have to mean doing something unilaterally or being better than everybody else. What it means to me, and what was pivotal uh in terms of my leadership journey was recognizing that being world class is actually being a part of a group, a group of people who can support one another, who can challenge one another, who can understand the challenges of your loneliness, maybe within your specific context or within your specific region or location or your chosen topic or field to try to make a difference. You may be alone on a day-to-day basis, but you can always come back to this community somehow, or be a part of this community, be a part of a network that gets it and that can be encouraging and also challenge you when you when you need it. And so that was very eye-opening for me, and it was very comforting for me to recognize that if I want to make an impact or make a change or challenge the status quo, even though I may be doing it in some ways by myself, I do have a tremendous backing, people that I you know know or that I can be plugged into who can help with that.

Manya Chylinski 6:19

That's a great realization of to know that you've got this community. So you talk about your experience at Harvard, you are a financial services executive or an expert in governance, and you've got that kind of corporate background that people think means one thing. And but you talk about values and emotional integrity. How did you come from a place of being in this career that I think people have a lot of preconceptions about what you might be thinking? And emotional integrity isn't one of them.

Identity Beyond Job Titles

Kenyada Meadows 6:55

Yeah, and that's you know, look, that's reasonable, that's fair. What I've what I'll say is I'll say a couple of things to start. First of all, some of the best, kindest, not just technically knowledgeable or intelligent people, but actually just good people that I've gotten to know and with whom I've even become friends over the years, have been people that I've met in the corporate environment. That's where I've spent most of my waking hours for most of the last 25 years. And so, you know, having said that, I've also met a lot of people who fit the stereotype and may even be worse than the stereotype. But I think it's important to acknowledge that it's not, you know, just all bloodthirsty animals, um, thinking only about money and savagery who who populate not just corporate America, but even Wall Street uh in particular. That said, I think it's really important to, and I've always worked very diligently to maintain my own personal identification and separate that from my professional um work, my accomplishments, the names of places that I have worked. I've never taken overwhelming pride in saying that I work at this place or I work at that place. Because I work at this place and I work at that place. And I didn't start it. I've probably done some things to hopefully make things better or at least keep the lights on uh and help people to make money and whatever, whatever the mission was of the organization where I worked. But at the end of the day, it's it's just not mine. Um that doesn't mean I didn't associate with it or take pride in it, but it was not me and it never was. And so I think keeping my own sense of identity strong, keeping, you know, I have very strong parental guidance growing up, and a lot of my values really come from that. They come from my community, come my they come from my Caribbean uh upbringing, they come from the things that I care about. I have a very strong sense of justice and a very low tolerance for anything that kind of thwarts that or gets in the way of that or challenges that unnecessarily. And I think that I've just never felt the need to tamp that down. I've never felt the need to mute that in case my boss has a problem with it, or in case, you know, it's not politically correct. I really don't care um about those things because at the end of the day, I live with myself. I have to look at myself. I have a daughter to raise, um I have a reputation to maintain, and I I have contributions to make in this world, I hope, and they need to be rooted and anchored in something real, not just um, you know, my my seeking a promotion or an extra couple of dollars. So for me, it's really, really straightforward and it always has been. Where I think there is a more recent difference is the fact that I've been much more vocal and talking about it a lot more. And I think that has just been a function of, you know, starting the podcast that I did Executive Dad in 2022, and starting my new company, the executive parent company, and just sort of framing up and also writing my book, The New Alpha, it has allowed me to sort of frame up a philosophy, but also to be vocal about what the philosophy is and what underpins it.

Struggle As Normal And Necessary

Manya Chylinski 10:10

Right. You're talking about staying true to yourself and being the whole human that you are in the work environment. I know that some people struggle with that. They struggle with whether it's their relationship with their boss or it's the kind of workplace they're in, they struggle with being their whole human selves in the work environment. What do you say to someone who is not as successful as it as you seem to be?

Balance As A Moving Target

Kenyada Meadows 10:37

I appreciate the way that you frame that. I guess what I would say, uh, if I could just reframe the the last part of your question, what would I say to someone who's struggling? I would say, uh, welcome, welcome to the planet Earth. Um, everybody struggles. Everybody struggles. I struggle. It's not just that I have struggled, I do struggle, right? And I will struggle. It's a foregone conclusion that you're gonna struggle. I think precisely what you struggle with and the value and importance that you put on certain things, that matters. So I think it really, it really matters to say, hey, you know, what is of consequence here? What's gonna matter in five years? When I'm 85 years old, if I'm if I live that long and if I'm cogent and you know, coherent, what am I gonna look back on and think? Uh that I gave up a full year of weekends trying to pursue a promotion that was only gonna net me X dollars and cost me my family or cause me to miss out on some formative moments in my family's life? Or is it gonna be, am I gonna really appreciate that we really enjoy the vacations that we took? And right. So at the end of the day, I think you have to figure out what it is that you're struggling with. Struggle is gonna happen, but some of it is unnecessary. And then I would also say, just like anything when you're balancing, right? And you think of a pendulum that swings, or you think of, you know, the Newton's cradle or whatever, only at one point is the pendulum ever fully vertical. And that's a very small moment in terms of the entire cycle of a swing. It's usually to the left or to the right of center, sometimes by a little, sometimes by a lot. But balance is what this tells us is balance is a dynamic and ongoing and sustainable activity, not just a condition that we should expect to maintain or to sit in indefinitely, right? And so uh struggle is gonna be a part of that. When we think about our existence and our engagement across those three domains, our relationships that worked, our relationships with the people at home, our relationship with ourselves, it's never gonna be fully equal. It's never gonna be fully balanced. And balance doesn't necessarily mean eight hours here, eight hours there, and eight hours uh somewhere else, because the quality, the focus, the intensity can be different, the needs will be different. If you have a sick kid, if you you yourself are sick, you're gonna have to focus on that. That doesn't mean that your entire life is gonna always be balanced. No, this requires your focus now, so you have to put less focus elsewhere, but you might make up for that or you may preempt that um and and and kind of bake that in. So I would say if you're struggling, first of all, don't worry about struggling. Don't beat yourself up for struggling. That's normal. Be much more selective about the things you're struggling with, that is in your control. And then also think about how you're framing up your struggle. Some of it's good, uh, some of it's helpful. Um, and then just be realistic and thoughtful about what balance means. Actually, you know, when I just said that that struggling is good or helpful, um, the thought that came to mind just then was the need for a butterfly to struggle in order to get out of the cocoon. You have a butterfly in a cocoon and and you see that it's struggling and you open it up and you try to help it out, you actually basically doomed that butterfly to a pretty uh short life and um a life on the ground because it's through the struggle that the fluids that need to actually enter the wings to make it strong enough to actually be able to fly that comes from the struggle.

The Butterfly And The Pool Goggles

Manya Chylinski 14:14

Right. I appreciate you saying that because I think we often, or speaking for myself, sometimes feel like the goal is to not struggle or to instantly get rid of it, or that it means something's wrong with me if I don't get this or if I'm struggling with it. And I appreciate the reminder that it is just part of life and we all do at different times for different reasons. I also really appreciate your talking about the concept of balance. We're not aiming for static. We have to understand that swing.

Practicing Discomfort To Build Capacity

Vulnerability Over Camouflage

Kenyada Meadows 15:20

Right, right. You know, I also just thought about when I had to look this up a a couple days ago, because I kept I kept saying Bob Beaman in my mind. Bob Beaman was uh, he's still alive, was uh an Olympic uh track and field athlete, a long jumper um who held the world record uh for for some time. But it's actually Bob Bowman, who was Michael Phelps' coach, swim coach. And I remember reading an article many years ago, and he was talking about, I think it was maybe was like US Olympic trials or something. It wasn't it wasn't super it wasn't super critical, it wasn't like the Olympics, but it was a pretty important meet. And and uh Michael Phelps' uh goggles were on the side of the pool, and Bob saw them and he stepped on them um purposefully uh to warp them. And if you've ever swam with goggles, I mean, first of all, I find them, I mean, they're helpful, but they're also kind of annoying, especially if water gets into them, right? It's like it's even worse than not having goggles, having goggles with water in them. And so when Michael jumped into the pool and began his race, of course, his goggles immediately filled up and he had to swim with just this annoying, frustrating uh condition. Um, he still won the race. But the point was of his coach was to help him to prepare for the unexpected, to expect the unexpected, and to and to see how he would uh handle adversity. As I think about raising my daughter, even in little ways now, I do things. I'm very supportive, we're very, you know, uh, we have a great relationship. She's so much fun, and we have a lot of fun together. But I also do things and and will continue to do things that are age appropriate, but that actually create a little bit of friction and tension for her because it's a character-building mechanism. And so again, thinking about, I mean, I guess we could probably spend the next three hours talking about struggle. I didn't realize I was so um so excited about struggle and struggling, apparently. I'll have to remember, I'll have to remember this uh the next time I'm really struggling with something. No, this is isn't isn't this great? Isn't it what you said you loved? Yeah, so I I think I think it's really, really important for a lot of reasons, you know, to to create even conditions for struggling, especially for for our children or for maybe our teams. Nothing that's harmful, nothing that is truly counterproductive, right? With an intent to help them to accelerate their ability to handle challenges.

Manya Chylinski 17:50

Right, because no life is without, as you said, without struggle, without challenges, without making mistakes. And it's important to learn how to move on from whatever's happening. So you work with high-performing men to help them lead as whole human beings. What question do you think we're still not asking about leadership and about leading as a whole person?

Bring Feedback Rituals Home

Humility And Hard Conversations

Current Work, Book, And Coaching

Kenyada Meadows 18:21

I have a lot of answers to that actually. I am working on an on a new book. Actually, I just spent the last three or four days refining and working on the outline, and that that actually speaks to what it means to basically not be a leader and the importance of followership. So that's actually pretty exciting and something that we don't really talk about that much. Um, but I'll give, I guess I'll give, use this opportunity as a as a little preview um for for that concept at least, uh, and then potentially some work that will come out of that. You know, yeah, this work began focused on men, and really this book is really focused on men, and it mirrors my own journey, my own, you know, questions, my own challenges of the last four to five years, becoming a father, dealing with COVID, balancing life, um, the various challenges, a sick parent, even though I don't really um talk about that in the book. I mean, these were some of the realities that I was facing and some frustrations in a specific role that I was in. But a lot of this, I mean, it really is cross-applicable. So even though the idea was focused on how do we identify vulnerability and leverage it to build strength as opposed to pretending to be strong in the areas that we could try to camouflage it, I see that as basically wearing a really bad toupee because everybody knows what our weaknesses are. Your friends know, your colleagues know. Uh, maybe they tolerate it because they're like the rest of you. But if you especially try to make it seem that you don't have that particular weakness, all you've done is basically combed over it, right? And that that almost never works. It's never authentic, it's never natural, it never really camouflages. So I think, but besides the fact that it's futile and kind of a useless activity, useless in terms of the outcome, it's a waste of time and resources. We're better off just saying, hey, here's an area in which I could use some help, or could you give me some feedback and let me know what you honestly think about this or that, or an area in which I could improve? And I think that's something that when you think about those three domains, that's something that we don't do, for example, in the home very much, right? Compared to our work. Um, we have all these formalized structures for feedback and communication and mid-year reviews and year-end reviews and 180 degrees and peer and upward feedback and all the rest of it, right? Um, obviously plenty of downward feedback. But we don't really necessarily do that uh uh at home. We don't necessarily ask our kids, hey, you know, how am I being a good mom? What would you change, Botter? What feedback could you give me? How am I being a good partner or a good father? Um, you know, how do we have that conversation in a calm way? How do we have it in a professional way, even though you're home? What if you presented it or prepared it or set the stage to treat it like a business meeting where you're actually trying to solve a real problem or you're trying to mend uh or build or maintain relationships? Um, and by the way, these are the relationships that matter. These are really the only ones that matter by far compared to even your professional ones, right? Hopefully you want to have stronger relationships with your children and your partner in life than you do with summon three officers down. So I think, you know, those are, even though I haven't given you necessarily so many explicit questions, I think these are some of the questions that we really want to ask, that we want to be asked, but that we want to ask of ourselves as well. And, you know, that takes a degree of awareness, of course. It takes time to step away and and some quiet time just to think and meditate. But it also requires a whole lot of you know humility as well and a preparedness to be uncomfortable, right? There's a lot of discomfort. If someone says, Hey, can you tell me what I'm not so good at? First of all, they may be uncomfortable, I'm telling you, and you're gonna be uncomfortable when you hear it.

Manya Chylinski 22:16

Yeah.

Kenyada Meadows 22:16

Uh, but that that's also a measure of a strong and authentic relationship when you can have those types of conversations.

Manya Chylinski 22:23

Yes. I think I feel like we do a lot of things in our lives to avoid discomfort. Um so Kenyada, we are getting close to the end of our time. So So can you tell us a little bit about what you're doing now these days, your work and your books?

Links, Gratitude, And Close

Kenyada Meadows 22:39

Yeah, yeah. So it's really exciting. I must say I've felt more optimism in the last few weeks looking into this year and starting these projects than um than I've than I can remember feeling. Um and it's because I'm feeling as fulfilled as I've ever felt, and I th and I anticipate more of that. Um and a lot of that is through or because of what I think is going to be uh meaningful contribution to other people. Not that what I did before wasn't meaningful, and you know, tens of millions of customers were uh part of my portfolio and my responsibility in my last role. So obviously that's a lot of people to kind of be thinking about and helping to safeguard. But I think the directness uh and the impact in terms of people's family lives, the relationships they have, their own calm, their own ability to meditate and to manage their emotions. And I think there's just so much positive to contribute and so much positive that can come out of this that I'm I'm just extraordinarily excited. And I talk about it um a great deal on the uh executive parentcompany.com in my, you know, in the about section, but it's also filtered through uh the work that I do. So one of the things that I I say, Manya, is that I am one of the very few executive coaches who has ever actually been an executive, right? So I know from both sides, I know what the pressures are from the big firms on Wall Street and big four accounting and and and the realities of the politics and you know what it takes to succeed and to be promoted and to you know to manage people to how it looks to listen attentively and not stack your questions and you know all the other things we were trained to do as coaches. Uh and so I I'm I'm really looking forward to blending that. And I've been doing it in my own life, but I'm looking forward to helping other other people in the in their lives. So executiveparentcompany.com is where you can go and um you know sign up for coaching or or initial uh uh assessments. Uh the new alpha, the book is uh linked through that website, but it's also available on on Amazon, Kindle is available, and also the audio version will uh very soon be uh available. And um Executive Dad is a podcast uh that you can find wherever you listen to your podcasts.

Manya Chylinski 25:04

Nice. Well, thank you so much. It was so lovely to talk with you. And I'm gonna put all links to that in the show notes and make sure people can reach you and learn more about you. But thank you so much for being here.

Kenyada Meadows 25:15

Thanks for having me.

Manya Chylinski 25:17

And thank you to our listeners for checking out this episode of Notes on Resilience. We'll catch you later.