Leveraging Leadership

Mastering Power, Office Politics, and Leadership in Modern Organizations

• Emily Sander • Season 1 • Episode 235

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Emily Sander talks with Tinna Jackson about navigating power dynamics as a Chief of Staff in the U.S. Senate, handling office politics, and the importance of emotional intelligence and trust in leadership. Tinna shares tips on building relationships with board members, managing micromanagers, and methods for better communication in remote or hybrid teams. She also discusses her book, The Power Play Journal, and her group coaching program for aspiring leaders.


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Who Am I?

If we haven’t yet before - Hi👋 I’m Emily, Chief of Staff turned Executive Leadership Coach. After a thrilling ride up the corporate ladder, I’m focusing on what I love - working with people to realize their professional and personal goals. Through my videos here on this channel, books, podcast guest spots, and newsletter, I share new ideas and practical and tactical tools to help you be more productive and build the career and life you want. 

 

Time Stamps:

00:48 Tinna's Background in Politics
05:09 Public vs. Private Sector Dynamics
06:18 Leadership and Emotional Intelligence
08:34 Communication in Remote Work
11:05 Building Team Relationships
14:59 Effective Leadership Strategies
16:54 Navigating Power Dynamics
18:46 Finding Influential Allies
20:04 Nonprofit vs. For-Profit Dynamics
22:49 Building Strong Board Relationships
26:40 The Power Play Journal
30:56 Group Coaching and Mentorship

emily-sander_1_11-12-2025_080152:

Welcome back to Leveraging Leadership. Tina Jackson joins me today. She is the author of the Power Play Journal and founder of Jackson Consulting Group. And after years of working across government, business and nonprofits, she helps leaders navigate power and politics with clarity and confidence. Tina, welcome to the show.

tinna-jackson_1_11-12-2025_110150:

Yes. Yes, Emily. Thank you for having me.

emily-sander_1_11-12-2025_080152:

Beautiful. So can you just give us a brief background of, of who you are and, and how you got to what you're doing now?

tinna-jackson_1_11-12-2025_110150:

Yes, absolutely. So I'm born and raised in Washington, DC it's the like, powerhouse of power, right? Um, and so I spent the majority of my career in national politics 10 years. 10 and a half years of that time was. Spent in the US Senate and half of that time was, uh, as deputy chief of staff.

emily-sander_1_11-12-2025_080152:

Beautiful. Well, let's start there'cause I know we have chiefs of staff listening who ears just perked up. So tell us about your time as Deputy Chief of Staff for, for a member of the Senate.

tinna-jackson_1_11-12-2025_110150:

Yeah, it was not without difficulty. Right. Um, you know, when you're working for someone high profile, um, you know, any CEO would be high profile, right? Um, it, um, not without difficulty, it was a lot of losing sleep. I can tell you that. It was definitely a tough balance between, you know, helping someone with their mission, organizing their priorities, and helping them determine what their priorities should be based on the landscape you are seeing, um, and reconciling that. The landscape that they see. So, um, you know, on top of that was also managing the day-to-day popups of staff drama, right? I mean, any chief of staff, chief of staff, chief of stuff, whatever. just, you know, dealing with personnel was a big chunk of that because we're all working together to, to move the work. and. You know, someone has a bad day, they wanna talk to you about it, which is interesting because clearly you've gotten to a point where staff trusts

emily-sander_1_11-12-2025_080152:

Yeah.

tinna-jackson_1_11-12-2025_110150:

that's very important. But with that comes, uh, less time for you to download and take a breather and, um, you know, reconcile your own thoughts. It was just a constant. Go, go, go. but a tough balance between the rest that you need to recharge and do it all over again the next day. to, you know, being effective in your role consistently on a daily basis, uh, especially when the boss has a question or has a bright idea that they've gotten in the middle of the night. And who do they call? The, the chief of staff, deputy chiefs or the, you know, the person that they trust the most. So I'm sure everyone, all chiefs of staff, uh, go through

emily-sander_1_11-12-2025_080152:

lots of nodding heads listening. Yes. And I'm curious, were you interacting with what you know, the chief of staff with the senator, who was your kind of primary point of contact?

tinna-jackson_1_11-12-2025_110150:

Primary point of contact with the, was the senator

emily-sander_1_11-12-2025_080152:

Okay.

tinna-jackson_1_11-12-2025_110150:

and the chief of staff equally, because at some point, you know, when you're working for, uh, for a, uh, politico, if you will, of staff is sort of on this. Same level as the member in many ways, right? The member is the talking head, the mouthpiece, the person that is out and about kissing babies and you know, meeting with constituents. The chief of staff is on the back end doing kind of the. Backend work and the strategizing and the fundraising to get the, to keep that member in office. Right. And so then there was my position that was somewhat supporting both of them in different ways. Right? I would be the first line of defense for the senator. I would even manage up. uh, the chief of staff and keep that person, aware of what was going on, having a pulse, because as you get close to an election cycle, the chief of staff can't be internal. of staff has to then become external, externally facing with the senator, right, with the, with the politico, with the member, and then the day-to-day is all on me. Is all on me. And also, you know, having a history. I had been with that member for 10

emily-sander_1_11-12-2025_080152:

Okay.

tinna-jackson_1_11-12-2025_110150:

so I went from being the executive aide to then becoming, you know, director of administration and deputy chief of staff. I have been and has. Seen all of the intricacies of the organization as a whole from looking at the numbers and the budget to actually doing the hiring of a, of a lot of the positions that I manage, and then managing multiple offices across the state of Nevada and in Washington DC Yeah.

emily-sander_1_11-12-2025_080152:

And I'm always curious when you are talking about, public office, they have a fixed tenure, so two years, four years, six years, and what does that do to the dynamic of the role? You kind of mentioned, hey, when certain cycles come up, chief of staff goes from internal to external, along with their member. Is there any, I'm just curious about the difference between. Public sector and private sector where, you know, CEO could be as short as a year, or could be as long as, you know, decades and decades. So I'm just curious about that dynamic.

tinna-jackson_1_11-12-2025_110150:

Yeah. Uh, a six year term for the Senate. Uh, and if you're in the House of Representatives, it's two

emily-sander_1_11-12-2025_080152:

Yep.

tinna-jackson_1_11-12-2025_110150:

tough because it's a constant election. You're constantly up for reelection and so you cannot afford to ignore your constituents at all, in the Senate there's a little bit of, leeway in, in that you can slow walk a lot of things. You could be more methodical.

emily-sander_1_11-12-2025_080152:

Hmm.

tinna-jackson_1_11-12-2025_110150:

you know, you can take time to determine what you're going to get involved in, how you're gonna get there and employ the strategy. Uh, so there's a lot, certainly a lot of strategy

emily-sander_1_11-12-2025_080152:

Yes, and our founding father set that up that way in on purpose, so to their great wisdom. But thank you for sharing that. That's super interesting. So going from public office. To office politics, which is what you kind of talk about now in lots of different realms. do people think about when they hear leadership and employee performance? Those are two big terms, but what kind of comes up in your world when you start talking about those things?

tinna-jackson_1_11-12-2025_110150:

Well, I can tell you it's, there's an absence of emotional intelligence. I can tell you that. People think, a lot of people think leadership is having a title,

emily-sander_1_11-12-2025_080152:

Hmm. Oh.

tinna-jackson_1_11-12-2025_110150:

C-E-O-C-O-O, director of this senior director of this. Some people think that it's title driven. Others think. That it's influence driven, and I can't necessarily disagree with that. I think that there are a lot of people, uh, scattered throughout organizations that do have a level of trust and influence more so than the person that's well above them. And that can be tricky for the people that are above in these C-level positions because the more influential people are the ones who have a real pulse on the organization, the person who actually knows the true. About what's going on. And they can be very powerful because they have information that could either help move the organization further, you know, forward if they share, if they're in a position to choose to share that information, or they withhold it and watch things crumble.

emily-sander_1_11-12-2025_080152:

Hmm. Yeah.

tinna-jackson_1_11-12-2025_110150:

Yeah.

emily-sander_1_11-12-2025_080152:

Yeah. So when you're working with teams or leaders who are dealing with office politics, and I mean, I always say, look, if you're dealing with two or more humans, you're gonna have conflict and disagreement. And that can be productive and fine. It also can be toxic and can bury you. but what, what kind of things are you seeing and facing and talking to, uh, the people you work with about in terms of like office politics and dynamics, and these two team members butt heads and these two whole departments can't get along.

tinna-jackson_1_11-12-2025_110150:

I can tell you that communication is always the breakdown. Communication is always an issue in every single organization. from written communication to, you know, once you finally do get together, and it's, the verbal breakdown. It's also, the nonverbal communication,

emily-sander_1_11-12-2025_080152:

yeah.

tinna-jackson_1_11-12-2025_110150:

the person, what they think, and you can see it in their face.

emily-sander_1_11-12-2025_080152:

Does it match up? Yeah. What you're saying doesn't match your face.

tinna-jackson_1_11-12-2025_110150:

Feeling. Um, so there's that. But you know, the other part is I think that because we've been remote for so long, it's broken down how we can build with our team members. I really do. I really do believe that, you know, there was a time, you know, before COVID. maybe if you sent an email, you, thought twice because you could just walk down to the person's office, stick your head in and just have a conversation. and it's done right now, and I think this has always been the case with email. You're doing a lot of, a lot of CYA. You're keeping more. It's, it's tough. and, and, and Zoom helps. Don't get me wrong. It does, but it's just very different not being in person and, and building a better rapport with your colleagues. So I do think communication is. Is, is the big piece. I think we've forgotten how to communicate effectively though, and actually, kind of meaning what we say without having to over clarify. the truth of the matter is a lot of organizations are under ese. Source, right? We've seen news reports. A lot of the federal governments, you know, a lot of positions that have gone away, even corporate entities, are now releasing thousands of people. So the people that are left holding the bag, holding the work, they have to figure things out. And so people are constantly. either burnt out, frustrated, and they have to find a way to communicate their concerns, without any backlash of, adding to the numbers of departures.

emily-sander_1_11-12-2025_080152:

Yeah. So you've mentioned some things that are a little bit, you know, tricky, you know, with people not being in person and people communicating to kind of, you know, CYA. What would you advocate doing in these, like if you, if you are in a remote position or remote setup, or even hybrid, what are some things that you can do to. communicate positively and effectively.

tinna-jackson_1_11-12-2025_110150:

I would probably do more. I would probably do, I'm assuming that people do their one-on-one. Right and do their, their group meetings or group team meetings. But I would probably do something like a group game night or something right online you know, do a wind down Thursday, wind down happy hour, or do a morning coffee, like just everyone get online and. You know, do a, do a quick coffee chat, uh, a standup meeting with coffee. I would do like lunch and learns. I would provide professional development opportunities. any way to get people communicating more.

emily-sander_1_11-12-2025_080152:

Yeah. Yeah. So when I was chief of staff, our CEO and COO, and I would go play Topgolf just every once in a while just to like sit there, like hit the ball, you know, eat some food and just kind of hang out. And sometimes we talked about work and sometimes we didn't. And it was just kind of sitting back and easing in to like just being around this person and developing relationships outside of the. What is the status update for this initiative type of thing. So I think that goes a long way. You had mentioned, leadership as it's not a title, which I totally agree with. It can be influenced certainly, but that's maybe not the whole picture. you mentioned we we're lacking emotional intelligence with which, uh, I can see all over the place. How does ego and leadership go together? What's the interplay between ego and leadership?

tinna-jackson_1_11-12-2025_110150:

Yeah, I think, I think there are different kinds of ego, right? Like I think you do have to have some level of confidence and. Boldness when you choose to go for a promotion and take on a leadership role where you are managing other people and also managing the output, the out the outcomes of those individuals, right? But the unhealthy ego where someone is not self-aware. And they are fully in belief that because I am chief this, that you have to do what I say when I say it, and some things may not make logical. you know, I, I, I think that there are a lot of people, and I hope there's, I hope that's not true, but I do believe that there are just a lot of people that can't handle what leadership really is. I, I do believe that leadership is very simple. Just be the good person. Like, remember the boss? We all remember the great bosses we had. We also are probably scarred by the bad bosses. My thing is, is don't leave a scar. Okay? Very simple. Don't leave a

emily-sander_1_11-12-2025_080152:

You no harm.

tinna-jackson_1_11-12-2025_110150:

Right? And, and what does that mean? Like, you know, if, if you hear that someone is not doing well, check in on, I'm not saying spend an hour, I'm saying stop by and just say, how are you doing and mean it. Because if, if the tables were turned, you would need that too.

emily-sander_1_11-12-2025_080152:

Hmm. Yeah.

tinna-jackson_1_11-12-2025_110150:

know, have a, a little bit of empathy.

emily-sander_1_11-12-2025_080152:

Yeah.

tinna-jackson_1_11-12-2025_110150:

It'll poop on you sometimes, you know, and that's a great, and that's a great thing. I do think that some people carry their own baggage in leadership. You know, coats of armor that are very difficult to break down. I think people walk into these positions, um, lacking trust, trust of themselves, which then manifest. Into micromanagement, I mean, I've had to give people strategies on how to, how do you manage a micromanager? Well, you give them all the information upfront so they don't have time to ask you what the status of that. Just beat them to the punch. You know, they're gonna ask you just beat'em to the punch.

emily-sander_1_11-12-2025_080152:

Yeah, and I've, I've seen a lot of people go, I'm the CEO, or I'm the COO, and therefore, like there's, there's a double-edged sword. I know the right answer. So just do what I say as you mentioned before. And also like I'm unsure, so I'm gonna sit here and waffle and kind of be unclear to the team. And that's like sometimes equally as as damaging. There's so many things you brought up. I have so many things going on in my head. but it's kind of the performative aspect of leadership where it's like, let me do these things'cause this is what a CEO is supposed to be doing, so I'm gonna do these things in a performative way and kind of disingenuous way. And then like you said, like asking someone like, Hey, how are you doing? And mean it. That's a big piece I see missing where it's like we can say the words, we can say the right words and we can say the political things, but it's, it's, we're not actually. Just dropping down to a human level and saying like, how are you doing? Seriously?

tinna-jackson_1_11-12-2025_110150:

Yeah. You know, I think, I think you're right. There are, there are a lot of leaders who have an idea of what leadership is instead of defining. leadership looks like for them. you know, I'm sure that there are all, there are all kinds of images and ideas of what leaders are supposed to do. I think that what you're supposed to do is take care of your staff and be, open, honest, and clear with them so that whatever mission or vision you have, the people will stand next to you and push you. Forward as the leader and follow you. that comes with helping them transform into the leaders they need to be, um, to lead their teams too. and you know, they, you're right, there are others who lawful because they're just not sure. They're, they're so inci. They're paralyzed by indecision. And instead of admitting it's okay to say, hey. I need some help on this. What do you guys think? This is the situation. What do you guys think?

emily-sander_1_11-12-2025_080152:

That's powerful, but that's so powerful.

tinna-jackson_1_11-12-2025_110150:

necessarily admitting that you don't know what to do. You are just asking for feedback. They are in the trenches. They are doing the work. They are managing the systems, they're developing the plans, and you are coming up with the vision, so it's okay. To go grassroots level and figure out what's going on in the field.

emily-sander_1_11-12-2025_080152:

They might get you to a better answer'cause they're closer to it. They see it from a different perspective. Absolutely. Yeah.

tinna-jackson_1_11-12-2025_110150:

and they have data. They have the data, so ask the questions. The ones who are not asking the questions, I think are more problematic

emily-sander_1_11-12-2025_080152:

more scary

tinna-jackson_1_11-12-2025_110150:

Yeah, they're moving forward, making decisions. They have no, and that's goes to trust when your staff doesn't trust you. Oh, that's when

emily-sander_1_11-12-2025_080152:

breakdown.

tinna-jackson_1_11-12-2025_110150:

start to start to break down and people start to leave.

emily-sander_1_11-12-2025_080152:

Yeah, so Tina, I get so many questions from people who go, well, I can't do this because this person is higher than me. Like power dynamics, hierarchy. I mean like, this is just how they feel. This is my boss and my boss's boss, and there's nothing I can do. What would you say to a person who's in that power dynamic situation?

tinna-jackson_1_11-12-2025_110150:

I would say, have you tried talking with them or asking them first before you say that? Because there's a fear there, right? Because. People immediately think I can't because instead of thinking, what if I did? And it works out really well.

emily-sander_1_11-12-2025_080152:

Ah.

tinna-jackson_1_11-12-2025_110150:

A lot of this is reframing, and kind of getting over that fear. You know, as a supervisor, manager, leader, you have a responsibility to your team. You have a responsibility to be available and to provide direction when it's needed, and clarity when it's needed, and if someone is fearful that they can't ask a question or they can't step forward and offer. Support, that's a problem. It's either an internal problem with them or that leader has put them in a position to think and feel that they're not open, that they're not reachable, they're not accessible.

emily-sander_1_11-12-2025_080152:

Yeah, I was just talking to someone the other day and they were in a situation where they have tried and they've seen other people try and they get shot down. Those other people just get shot down and so she's like, I've said my piece, but this is just a battle. I'm not gonna win, so I'm just gonna have to sit here and, and like take it basically. Is that a okay. That might be a situation if it's so bad, comprehensively, so bad, you might need to look at other opportunities and get yourself outta that situation. Or if it's, Hey, this is not ideal, but it's the situation we're in right now for a temporary period of time. How, how would you guide that person who's like, I've tried. I, I really have, and it work.

tinna-jackson_1_11-12-2025_110150:

Yeah. You know, I think every leader has a primary influencer, whether it's a chief of staff, whether it is a senior advisor or someone. There has to be someone that these people can go to and say, Hey. have these concerns. I'm hitting a brick wall. I'm afraid that if we don't do X, this could happen. Right? And I think that anytime you try to hit someone with a pain point, there's gotta be some relief somehow. And if the staff are willing to. You the support to make sure that that relief, you know, occurs. That's a great thing, I think it's important to figure out who these influential people are so that when you're running into these roadblocks that you can go to those people, those individuals that can support the staff in getting to that principal's ear.

emily-sander_1_11-12-2025_080152:

And I love what you said there. I want chiefs of staff to go back and listen because very likely you are that person. For your executive and for your team. So being that person who they can come to and say, here's like the solution, but here's the issue and here's, I need someone to really listen to this and make sure that the principal knows about it and you can deliver it in whatever way you want. Chief of staff, you can buffer it, but I need to know that this message is getting through. So I think that's so, so important. So thank you. do, you deal a lot with nonprofits, so I'm wondering is there a slightly different power dynamic with a for-profit and a nonprofit entity?

tinna-jackson_1_11-12-2025_110150:

Somewhat. I think it's, I think nonprofits, are a little more difficult because. You know, there's a lot of passion. There's a lot of passion, mission-driven work going on. But that doesn't mean that the executive director or the president and CEO knows how to manage

emily-sander_1_11-12-2025_080152:

Hmm.

tinna-jackson_1_11-12-2025_110150:

so there's that clash of, passion and vision. motivation and execution. and, and if you don't have the right leader that can help make good decisions on, employing the right staff, the organization is gonna flail a little bit, things are gonna move slowly. and it could be an issue for funders, for board members. Um, you know, work gets, work travels really fast when things aren't going well. Um, and so, you know, these nonprofits have to deal with boards, right? You've got boards who have a different view, a different viewpoint, of what's going on and whatever landscape they're in. And you have CEOs and executive directors who are trying to move a vision forward. Sometimes they are both not in alignment

emily-sander_1_11-12-2025_080152:

Yeah.

tinna-jackson_1_11-12-2025_110150:

can see pretty clearly what's not working.

emily-sander_1_11-12-2025_080152:

and you mentioned boards and I'm like, boards have their whole ecosystem of power dynamics and politics and it's kind of like, while you might not be in, in that every day, you'd best be aware of what's going on so you can kind of find your footing when you interact with the board.

tinna-jackson_1_11-12-2025_110150:

That's right. That's right. And, look, it's, it's tough. A lot of boards are unpaid. These are

emily-sander_1_11-12-2025_080152:

Yeah.

tinna-jackson_1_11-12-2025_110150:

And then you've gotta wonder, okay, do you guys, do you really have, the time to devote to helping us move this vision forward? You know, as a volunteer board, it's tough because usually they have their own organizations. To, to manage. they may also be running nonprofits. They may also be in senior level positions in other organizations. Um, and I mean, with the political climate and you know, whether or not these organizations, these nonprofits are federally funded, a lot of that has gone away. And a lot of organizations have had to think about, what's in their future? What does their future look like?

emily-sander_1_11-12-2025_080152:

Yeah, if you're talking to a CEO or a chief of staff who's working with the board where there's politics swirling around, maybe you've got some unpaid seats, maybe you have some people who are very vested and interested in how the company's doing. what advice would you give them just in terms of like navigating that whole dynamic?

tinna-jackson_1_11-12-2025_110150:

The tough thing is managing those relationships individually, if you

emily-sander_1_11-12-2025_080152:

Mm.

tinna-jackson_1_11-12-2025_110150:

look, relationships are very important. They're very critical. I learned that very early in my career. If you can spend time with each board member, do it. I, and I know it's a lot of work. I know that some of these boards are, you know, 10, 20 people. I don't care. Do it because the more work you do on the front end will save you on the back end. The, the deeper the relationships are that you build, the easier it is to navigate the personalities and manage the information flow to your boss. Whether it's an executive director or CEO. you could also be, you know, the, the problem solver for all of the issues that come up because you're already aware of them. You can try to prevent them. you know, you'll be in a, you'll be better positioned to work through them when they come up,

emily-sander_1_11-12-2025_080152:

Yeah, and I always say, you know, for chiefs of staff, build the foundation with the relationships with your principal, with the ELT. So that partly so that you can challenge and you can have tough conversations later on. So if you do that like right out the gate and it's nothing else but just challenge, you're gonna have a certain dynamic. But if you set that foundation. Upfront and take the time, then you're able to do that within a safe kind of, uh, space. on the flip side, if you're talking to a board member or a CEO who's like, look, I wanna have emotional intelligence. I wanna have empathy. I wanna ask how people are doing and really mean it, and I also need this team to perform at a high level. I mean, you can, you can carry both things at the same time, but I'm wondering how you advise people or kind of what your philosophy is around, around that.

tinna-jackson_1_11-12-2025_110150:

I always like to ask board members, why are you on this board? Right? Are are, is it, is it just to add board member of

emily-sander_1_11-12-2025_080152:

Yeah.

tinna-jackson_1_11-12-2025_110150:

To

emily-sander_1_11-12-2025_080152:

Yeah.

tinna-jackson_1_11-12-2025_110150:

to your resume, you know, your profile. Um, because, you know, look, these nonprofits are, some of them are struggling. Um, and, and during those times, during those critical times in crises, um, you need board members to step up in different ways, whether it's raising more money or reaching out to the right people or tapping into their personal networks that they themselves have built throughout their careers. Um, and so I always like to ask. You know, why are you on this board? I think that's an interesting question because either they're gonna be passionate about the issue, passionate about the organization, and if they don't know, then you know, uh, yeah, maybe it's time to take a look at this board member and replace that person at some point.

emily-sander_1_11-12-2025_080152:

And just like a, a little side note here, lots of people I think. Believe that, oh, I have to be of a certain caliber or certain place in my career to be on a board. And oftentimes boards are looking for like passionate people who like maybe have some experience in this area, but it's not necessarily a certain profile or mold. I'm just wondering what your thoughts or experience are with that.

tinna-jackson_1_11-12-2025_110150:

Yeah. You know, I. A lot of the boards that I have seen, I've seen some really great boards. I have, there's, there's some great boards. Um, I think the ones that struggle are the ones where they have no criteria

emily-sander_1_11-12-2025_080152:

Hmm.

tinna-jackson_1_11-12-2025_110150:

for their board period. Um, I'm actually working with a, a couple of nonprofits where they're trying to their boards, um, and they've never established, you know, what it takes to be a board member

emily-sander_1_11-12-2025_080152:

Oh

tinna-jackson_1_11-12-2025_110150:

organization. Well, that's the start, right? There's no onboarding. You don't have a philosophy, you don't have committees and responsibilities laid out. Um, so a lot of board members don't know what their roles should be, what their roles are.

emily-sander_1_11-12-2025_080152:

That's, yeah, that's tough. Yeah. Well, you don't know what you're trying to do or how you're trying to do it. That's, that's tough. Um, so your book, the Power Play Journal, who is that for? How, who does that help?

tinna-jackson_1_11-12-2025_110150:

Oh my gosh. a part of me that wants to say it's for everyone. Technically it's, when I, when I was writing that book, I was thinking of my colleagues at the time, you know, working in national politics. I was with the political committee. and a lot of people, it's easy in po I'm, that's wrong. I'm not gonna say. Easy. was gonna say, it's easy to be promoted in politics. That is not true. think that if you are any organization and you're a trustworthy person and you do good work, you are going to get promoted if you communicate well, which is one of the highest levels of value in many organizations,

emily-sander_1_11-12-2025_080152:

Yeah.

tinna-jackson_1_11-12-2025_110150:

If you communicate well, you will get promoted. but there's always a missing piece. There's always management training that's missing. It's like, Hey, you did really well on this. Let's promote you and give you this opportunity. But it's like, okay, they've never managed anyone before. Now they're managing 12 people.

emily-sander_1_11-12-2025_080152:

Different skillset.

tinna-jackson_1_11-12-2025_110150:

12 people, um, not 10, 12. and so if you've never exercised that muscle, you've never managed a project involving multiple people, if you don't have the self-awareness to know what makes you tick as an employee, what's gonna make others tick and hold on, what's gonna make them tick when you speak to them? Some people, um, have multiple personalities when they're managing. They're one way with this group. They're another way with this group. they may have closer, uh, closer ties to someone else.'cause remember, they're, they're going from pe. Promotions, they're going from peer to manager. and that's a, that's a struggle. Some people struggle with now, being the boss. And what are my friends gonna think of me now?

emily-sander_1_11-12-2025_080152:

Hmm.

tinna-jackson_1_11-12-2025_110150:

have treat them? Do I have to, I have to act differently. I'm the boss now, but I can't act differently with them because they're gonna think X of me. those are really tough to, to reconcile. So when I was writing that book, I was trying to think of ways where I could be really tough and make people self-reflect. At the end of each strategy I discuss, but also think of it logically. What are the skills that you need when you become a leader? Strategic planning, you gotta be resilient. You gotta be ethical, right? You have to think about the legacy that you're building, you know, throughout your career. And so there's a part of me that believes it's kind of an instruction manual for anyone that wants to, anyone that wants to go into leadership. You know, whether you're in politics, in a nonprofit, or. you are the manager at Chick-fil-A, right? You're, you're managing a line, you're managing people, right? And so, yeah, it's for anyone who's aspiring to lead or who's already in those positions and needs support,

emily-sander_1_11-12-2025_080152:

Very cool. So it kind of sounds like, I like the self-reflection part where it's like, Hey, take just a dedicated time at the end of each chapter section to think about what are, what are my strengths and what are my growth areas, because so many people skip that step and just don't understand themselves and then go out into the world and wonder why things happen. so I like that you have dedicated pieces at the end of each section for that. yeah. And it's kinda like a tool book or a toolkit for people going out into new levels of leadership or new levels of power. Is that, is that fair? Accurate to say? Oh.

tinna-jackson_1_11-12-2025_110150:

Like there's one. There's, um, the, probably the most lengthy chapter in, uh, in the book is strategic planning. if you can't vision the future and how to build that capacity to get to that future, it's gonna be tough as a leader, especially in nonprofit. You're dealing with the board. They wanna know what, what's your vision? What are we doing? What are we doing for the next three to five years? You know? Um, and if you, if you don't have answers for that, if you haven't had those thoughts, if you're just dealing with the day to day and you don't take time to step back and plan for the future, what are you doing this for? What are your goals?

emily-sander_1_11-12-2025_080152:

Yeah. Yeah,

tinna-jackson_1_11-12-2025_110150:

so,

emily-sander_1_11-12-2025_080152:

power play journal, and then you also have group coaching, so just a little touch on that. Who would benefit from your group coaching program?

tinna-jackson_1_11-12-2025_110150:

Oh, yes. So I gotta tell you, a lot of what I built based on past voids for myself throughout my career. Coming up in my career, I did not have many mentors. I didn't. have a mentor until I got to the Senate. so before working in the Senate, I had already been working like 10, 12 years. Um, and so when I started building this group coaching program, it's called Pivot to Power. One of the things I wanted to reconcile was. The effective performance of employees and impactful leadership. Right? so I'm walking into these organizations with my CEO coaching clients or, you know, organizational management clients. And then I'm talking to staff. I, I, it's like we're talking about the same organization, but we're talking about two different organiz. It's possible. Okay. The leaders of these organizations have one idea of how the organization is doing and how they feel about the staff. The staff has a totally different view of where the organization is going, what they should be, and so there's like no clarity. So I'm like, how do you reconcile that? Okay. And so I built pivot to power to try to close that gap

emily-sander_1_11-12-2025_080152:

Ah.

tinna-jackson_1_11-12-2025_110150:

facing it on emotional intelligence, having, you know, a. A junior level program with, with c with, with professionals who can get monthly group coaching, right. And then there's a portal with some, um, some recorded content. Um, but then I have a 90 day accelerator called Strategic Focus. These are the people that are working closely with the C street or with the C-suite or are trying to get there and what it's gonna take to get there. So there's a lot of, there's a lot of conflict management, there's a lot of there. It's, it's live hot. Seat group coaching and consulting on a weekly basis. The reason I built the program that way, and I've had people tell me, you're gonna burn out, I'm like, no, I'm not. It's this is, this is necessary because I have, I've been in other coaching programs myself. You're a coach, you've done this too. I hate when I have a question and someone tells me to go read module,

emily-sander_1_11-12-2025_080152:

Ah, yes. Yeah. Yeah.

tinna-jackson_1_11-12-2025_110150:

It's like, answer my question right now and, and the reason I structured it this way is the reality is people are in crisis. If you look on TikTok, people are crying every day. People are in their car praying before they go to work. People need a space to sit with people that are going through the same thing. They're going through that they have the same challenges. They need to hear from each other and build community. They also need advice and support on the spot. Um, one of the things I added to the program this year, later this year was, um, AI support. So I have my own bot, her name's Shelly. Um. Like having Tina Jackson in your back pocket, because you know people have issues in the middle of the night. And I'm not gonna wake up in the middle of the night'cause I can choose now so they can use Shelly and get some of their questions answered. and then I have what's called an inner circle for my CEO clients. The way and the way I structured this inner circle is that they can actually bring along someone in the strategic focus program and the mentorship program as. participation.

emily-sander_1_11-12-2025_080152:

Okay.

tinna-jackson_1_11-12-2025_110150:

it allows them to do a little bit of succession planning through the program. So.

emily-sander_1_11-12-2025_080152:

So you got book, you got programs, you got coaching where if someone's like, oh my gosh, I need to reach out to Tina. I need to join one of these programs, or at least check out her book, where is the best place to find all that information?

tinna-jackson_1_11-12-2025_110150:

Awesome. So the book is on, uh, is on Amazon. It's the Power Play Journal, battle Tested Strategies for, uh, for uh, impactful leadership. And, uh, I'm on LinkedIn, Tina Jackson, I'm on, everything is Tina Jackson. So Tina with two Ns,

emily-sander_1_11-12-2025_080152:

with two ends. That's right. We'll have all that in the show notes as well. But Tina, thank you very much for being here. Really appreciated the conversation.

tinna-jackson_1_11-12-2025_110150:

Awesome. Thank you so.