Aligned Leadership: The Work Behind the Role with Astrid Sundberg

In this heartfelt and unfiltered conversation, Chisom Udeze sits down with Astrid Sundberg,  Executive Director of Operation Smile Norway to explore the evolution of leadership, from corporate ambition to mission-driven impact.

Astrid brings over 30 years of experience across scale-ups, start-ups, and global organizations. Together, they unpack what it means to lead with clarity, humility, and emotional honesty,  especially in a world where leadership is often caught between performance and purpose.

They cover:
— The difference between people leadership and functional leadership
— Why autocratic systems still linger beneath modern leadership culture
— How grief, burnout, and boundaries can sharpen the way we lead
— Building financially sustainable organizations with soul
— Hiring beyond credentials — the case for intuition and wild cards
— The cost of people-pleasing in leadership — and how to let go
— How to create impact without losing yourself in the processAstrid shares candid stories about leading teams of 200+, navigating career shifts, and leading a nonprofit that honors her late father.At its core, this episode is about the inner work of leadership.

Because sustainable leadership requires self-awareness, boundary-setting, and the courage to evolve.

Astrid’s reflections reveal the often invisible shifts that matter most:
— Moving from people-pleasing to principled leadership
— Letting go of inherited leadership patterns that no longer serve
— Learning to lead from alignment instead of obligation
— Choosing legacy and values over speed or ego
— Creating culture that holds both compassion and accountability

Transcript

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Welcome to Overnight Wisdom, a show where we sit with changemakers, artists, business leaders, and thinkers. Each conversation is an invitation to slow down, to go deeper, and unearth the quiet insights that shape who we are. If you're seeking honest reflections, unexpected wisdom, and a deeper understanding of what it takes to not merely survive, but to thrive. You're in the right place. What does it mean to lead well without losing yourself in the process? In this episode of Overnight Wisdom, I sit down with Astrid Sundberg, a seasoned leader and the executive director of Operation Smile Norway. With over 30 years of experience across startups, scale-ups and global organizations, Astrid brings hard-won clarity to what leadership really demands, from building sustainable systems to navigating burnouts. grief, people pleasing and everything in between. We talk about what it means to lead with integrity, how to build culture with intention, and why sustainable leadership starts with alignment, not obligation. It's about the work behind the role, the inner shift that allow us to grow, evolve and lead with courage. Let's begin. Hi, Astrid. How are you doing? Hi Chisom I'm good, thank you. I'm good. Thanks for having me on the podcast. Good to have you. Good to have you. So I know you, but a lot of my audience might not know you. So let's meet you. Tell us about Astrid. Okay, what about Astrid? So I'm a Scandi Brit. I have a Norwegian mum and an English dad. Grew up in Worcestershire in England and I relocated here to Norway in 2012. Actually is a single mum with a three year old in tow and I've been a leader for over 30 years now, principally in the start-up, scale-up, hyper-growth, blitz scale-up, stories. I've led teams of 200 people. I work for global companies of up to 1,000 employees. And I've also worked in several sort of strategic leadership roles. So I've worn many hats. Those hats have ranged from sales director to chief HR officer. So I sometimes say I'm the queen of the career pivot as well. I'm married to my Swedish husband and we parent three kids between us, age 19, 16 and 10. I'm also uh a middle child of three siblings. And of course I'm a daughter, a daughter who's still very much on the grief journey because I lost my dad two years ago. And right now I'm executive director of a company called Operation Smile, a new nonprofit here in Norway, but a large nonprofit globally. And we provide free, safe surgery for children in low income countries born with cleft lip and palate conditions. very very personal for me because it's something that my dad was actually actually born with. And then outside my day job I'm committed to a range of things. I volunteer, I'm a mentor, I have my advocacy and campaign work which is mostly geared towards gender-based violence and anti-human trafficking and when I'm not doing that I like to potter and poodle around in my little suburban garden where I talk to my plants or swear at my hosepipe. It's my kind of way to defrazzle from the existential malaise. So yeah, that's me. That's my vibe. Thanks for sharing. I'm always fascinated by how people introduce themselves and what they say. it's, I think, I mean, it's not a mirror into someone's soul, but of course it's interesting to see what is coming off of them at that moment in time about who they are. So yeah, thanks for sharing. Astrid, have you always aspired to leadership? It wasn't like the dream job I wanted to do when I was a kid. But I think once I got into the world of work in my first graduate job, then I really wanted to. And I think the reason for that was I was working in a blitz scale up success story. was one of the really successful recruitment companies of the 1990s. And I saw that the most of the career paths to get somewhere. were in leadership roles. So I guess it just seemed like a very natural choice for me. And I became a leader quite early. I became a leader, I think, I got the first promotion to office manager when I was about 22 or 23. That's young to be a leader. I mean, what were they even thinking, putting me in a leadership role? It's quite scary, really. So yeah, I'm also quite competitive. In my first graduate job, were sort of four of us put into one of the new offices and the CEO kind of said to us, there's one role for office manager and that will be one of the four of you. And I think, you know, being a quite naturally competitive middle child syndrome, if you want to call it that, I just thought I'm going to go for this. Hmm. That's interesting. what was the appeal? So yes, if you wanted to go anywhere, being competitive, but what was the allure? Like what is on the other side of leadership for you? Well, at the time, cause I reckon that has evolved, but at the time, was it more money? Was it freedom? Was it a little bit of autonomy or independence? What was the appeal for you? Honestly, at 22, I think it probably would have been the money, the opportunity to climb up the ladder. That would have been appealing. I think also that... It looked glamorous being a leader. I could see the other leaders, you know, we were a growing global company, got to travel around, got to stay in hotels. You know, I was just a kid straight from uni. This is my literally my first graduate job that I started with a ton of student debt and no real idea what I wanted to do. So I think my perception was that it looked quite glam. thought, know, I want to do this, but I didn't have much idea at that stage. I had not read books on leadership. like the the numerous books i've devoured now i guess i was a bit green i guess i was a bit naive Yeah. What has changed for you now in terms of how you even think about it? what I think of leadership now, I guess if only it was as simple as perhaps the 22 year old me considered it to be. mean, leadership is some of the hardest work I've done. It's It's demanding, it's challenging, it's not all a barrel of laughs. It can be extremely tedious as well. And I've definitely in sort of my last couple of roles, I've been in leadership roles of much smaller teams, which is definitely less challenging than the roles I've done where I've had, you know, staffing responsibility for 200 people plus, or often I've had groups of leaders is reporting into me. So I think I prefer more strategically focused leadership of smaller teams and working more sort of conceptually with growth and scale up than just this sort of very operational roles where you're responsible for everyone, their career journeys, whether they show up, whether they deliver. I'm not sure that's the kind of leadership that I would want to go back into now. I feel I've been there and done that. I think also just that difference between people leadership and functional leadership roles. And I think a lot of people start out wanting to be leaders because it does look appealing and it does come hopefully with the bigger check and with more freedom, with more autonomy. But I think people miss just how difficult and demanding it can be and how much you need to learn about yourself in order to lead people well. I think oftentimes people think just, I functionally have this role, I have the skills, so I'm automatically a leader, but that actually doesn't go hand in hand. So I do want to ask you, what type of leader are you? I thought you were going to say what type of leader were you? I was prepared to answer that with starting off not a very good one, which I think would apply to a lot of people in my situation. Right now, my leadership style is based on being a democratic leader. uh I lead with... Democratic leader? think it's leading with empathy. think it's being a good listener. I think it's being able to have hard conversations. I think it's looking at people or teams as a whole. I think it's understanding the importance of team wellbeing and team trust. Hmm. What does that do for decision making? I struggle with the idea of democracy in general, right? Because, so what does that mean for how you make decisions? I think my interpretation of democratic leadership is, this might sort of explain a bit better, my leadership journey was at a time in the 90s in the UK where leadership styles were autocratic. Mm. Mm. very controlled right down to you were terrified if you were like literally 30 seconds after 8am to get into the office. There was uh a rule by fear kind of culture in many companies back then. So I think when I think of democratic leadership, I'm thinking of the absolute opposite of this sort of very autocratic leadership that I had, which still terrifies me. I still have dreams about being late. you job when I was 22 and being there and worrying about getting there because imagine things like that were installed in me as being the worst thing you could do to be one minute late, know, sackable offence. So I, yeah, I'm using democratic to be the opposite end of autocratic. Yeah. Okay, that makes sense. And how do you make decisions? what guides you in terms of how you lead and how you make decisions within an organization and maybe to frame a little bit more is I've been reflecting a lot around how a lot of leaders they say in the workplace, say for example, I mean, we both live in the Nordics and We have a very on paper egalitarian society. There's this need to tell people at work, you know, this is a flat organization. We're all the same like this whole nice thing that's supposed to make people feel good But it actually does not work in practice, right? All he does often times is that it confuses people because if for me as a CEO I walk into work, and I'm just like listen y'all we're all the same right what we're all part of the decisions But then realistically, I get to make the decisions about money, about what gets done, about the strategy, right? I get the final say. So I guess my question for you is reflecting on, is there something that guides you? So for me, it's just that honesty. Like being honest about the situation that I'm in, being honest about my role in that room and the power that I have in that room, for example, right? So. I wanted to check in with you in terms of how do you think of it? yeah, I think what guides me these days is being authentic. Being authentic and where needed being vulnerable as well. I think that's definitely been a leadership formula that's also been in evolution for me. I was not always like that at all. And you know this sort of experience that I've also had with the egalitarian structure in Norway, I mean that was a shock for me when I moved here in 2012. there was so many bits of it that didn't make sense to me that the CEO sort of sat with us all having lunch. mean, that never would have happened in my previous company. I think I pretty much learned I was a director in the UK before I moved to Norway. So when I started working for a huge company in Norway, seeing the CEO just sitting there with whoever was there pulling up a pew and having a chat with them. That early experience really, really bewildered me. I think to the point thinking, God, I hope he doesn't come and sit with me one day. You what will I talk to him about? So I have some funny experience with the egalitarian work environment here in Norway, but I have to say it's still a preference to me. if I compare what I had come from and the kind of work cultures that I'd been em in in the UK, which felt very different to what I entered into here in Norway. Right. think one of the things I also appreciate across the board, I think in Norway or the Nordics, is you have your president or the prime minister taking the same train as everybody else, It's not uncommon to find the leader of a shipping company just dressed as normal, being the same person as you are on a bus. I think there is a difference between that egalitarian space or that space where there is equality because the social systems and structures facilitate that. I don't think that should be muddled up though with the idea of leadership, right? In terms of, yes, I can sit with you as a CEO at lunch, but it is clear though that I still make the decisions I'm not going to pretend that I don't. And I think that's a challenge. Like in workplaces where people start struggling is they are told, you can make decisions, but it's not clear that you can bring me suggestions. I will consider them, but ultimately I get to decide. And I think for you now in the space where you work and you've kind of shifted from, you know, the startup scale up space, corporate sector. Now you're in the nonprofit NGO kind of space. And there are also different expectations, no? do you think the expectations of you now as an executive director, has changed have you seen a shift sector-wise? Definitely. you know, I'm very new to the nonprofit sector. It is a completely different industry, but there are many, many similarities as well. You know, I still have to report on fundraising, on the business development cultivation pipeline. You know, there's many, similarities to when I was doing more commercial facing sales roles, for example. But I think that the key difference that I've experienced and it hasn't been long, it's only been a year, is everyone feels quite bonded and embedded together in this joint purpose. You know, our global CEO of the company, she sort of almost talks about, know, our currency is the children we provide operations for, know, everything comes back to, but is this going to get... more operations for the children and the babies who need surgery. And that's quite a powerful reminder in a P&L meeting where we're looking at what's there and what needs to come in that our end goal or it's not a product, but that's sort of what I'm used to working with is a product. How many of these will we sell or we get to? It's completely different. It is about transforming lives. one of the conversations that I think is really important to talk about is how we keep businesses, organizations, whatever it is, No matter the type of sector we work in. As long as we're leading an organization or a business, we need to talk about money. We need to talk about sustainability. We need to talk about health. Right? across the board, across your experience, what do you normally look for in terms of gauging how you're doing organizationally, how you're doing financially, and what your sustainability looks like in the short term, medium term, and long term? Yeah, so right now, I guess there's three key areas that we're looking at. You we're a market entry non-profits, very small team, and we're trying to break into the Norwegian market. So the focus has largely been on visibility and credibility. That's where we've had to start. You you don't just go out and start sort of banging the fundraising drum to earn money. I think where we've started has been building visibility through things like events, through social media and marketing, and then through outreach within personal networks. Those have been the three key areas, I guess you could say. And then in terms of what was the second part of your question, the impact, how do we measure the impact? do you ensure also just financial health and how do you measure that you are on the right path, I mean, we're in the long game of trying to build corporate partnerships. So I think this is a slow process. You know yourself that a partnership meeting isn't a one and done. It's a cultivation of a relationship. It's a game of patience. It's kind of perseverance, but... Yeah, also, also patience. mean, you can't sort of really rush it. And I think for us, a lot of what we're trying to do is focus on showing the impact of what we're doing, which is very much rooted in two areas. One is local capacity building and the other one is system strengthening. And I think for any company working with sustainability or SDGs or in health equity, they will understand how those objectives are really, really important in the health equity space. Hmm. Right. Absolutely. So as an organization that, as you said, you know, market entry, it's a big organization globally and it's relatively new in Norway. right now you're building a team and we all know that no matter how small your team is having the right people on board. you know, makes a world of difference. So when you think of talent, what do you look for? Yeah, I mean, obviously I've come from a talent acquisition and talent management background. So in my early career, we would sometimes be doing 15 to 20 interviews a day and that got boring. So I guess I've learned a lot about what to look for, what not to look for, know, warning signs, things like that. But I think... I'm also quite intuitive when it comes to talent management. I don't just like to stick to a tick box. I have a sort of love hate relationship with myself for my tendency to be a sucker for a wild card. um It can work out. really really well you know to sometimes go for someone who perhaps wasn't necessarily what you thought you wanted but something they said just resonated or they brought something else in where you think yeah you know I like that I think I'm sometimes a little bit attracted to someone who maybe brings in something different a bit of a rebel but I also wouldn't recommend that strategy because when you when you take a risk on a wild card it has to be the right kind of wild card and if you take a risk on the wrong kind of wild card then that can yeah that can bite you in the bottom. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Absolutely. for the longest time, we've been told hire people for skills, previous experience, where they've been, la de la de la. And I think the older I get, the more I engage with people, the more I hire people, the more I talk to people across different organizations and work with them. I mean, it's exceedingly clear. that you don't hire for skill. Like I don't hire for skill, you know, like for me, it's important to hire for, you know, attitude for, you know, people who can learn people who are willing, but the right attitude, especially now, I think like in the age of technology and AI, like a lot of what skill is, is becoming obsolete. So it's, it's the attitude that matters. how do you then navigate wild card, for example, when it doesn't work out. Yeah, when it doesn't work out, I think I would always start with looking at the part I played in it. Hmm. obviously if you've hired a wild card or whatever the hiring situation is, I think I would start with what's the part I played in it, what's led down to whatever it is, the breakdown or the difficult employee situation. And for a good 10 year chunk of my career, I worked in HR. So I mean, I was having to deal with a lot of cases around either underperforming staff or staff conflicts, which were always really difficult and then very very challenging issues like harassment cases and you know and even worse. So in those situations my role was very much coming in and being both the mediator but you know ensuring we were following the right legal discourse around the conversation and the meetings and the follow-up. And I think I learned a lot from those meetings. But for the here and now, I think for me it's... looking at the part that I played, I think it's open dialogue and I think it's empathy. you know, I always have this overriding desire to want to leave things on a good note. I think it comes from the kind of parents I have, the kind of family I have. I always have this real hope and optimism, well, let's try and end it the best we can. Yeah And that can sometimes be a lofty goal. In some cases it's not possible, is it? Yeah. I mean, I think at the end of the, if you've done your bit, you know, of course, like it's, leaving things on a good note. It takes, takes two or more people, right? It'd be great if we say, okay, let's leave this on a good note and it automatically happens. So that willingness is also necessary from the other party. I do think though, that as long as you've done, you know, your best to facilitate this ultimately does all you have. And to what you said around, you look at your role in it, I think there's a very reflective and grounded way to look at things. for me, that comes up as, I'm hearing you say, radical responsibility and accountability, right? Because a lot of leaders externalize cause and effect. And even if they don't have a direct hand in the thing. It's always easy to say, no, no, no, that was just a messy situation. I was not a part of it. But I think it's always important as leaders to say, what was my role? Right? Like, how did I participate in this outcome? And what is this here to teach me? Because if we're not reflecting and introspecting, then it's like we probably end up making similar mistakes or we're not really reflecting and improving on the type of leaders we should be as we move on or move on along our paths. And I think it, I think I agree with you and I think it takes, it takes a lot of humility to be able to do that. I think some people are really afraid of getting it wrong. I think you have to be quite comfortable to be able to say, look, in this situation, I messed up here because when I look back, what I could have done differently, where I could have been more effective was here. I think that objectively helps the situation where people can, take responsibility for something because there's always something that could have been done differently. So yeah, I subscribe to that as well, definitely. Thanks for sharing. So you've talked about democratic leadership, you've talked about authenticity. How do you stay recognizably you in every situation And how has your values or your voice evolved or stayed the same over time in your journey? I think something that's important for me is there needs to be an element of playfulness and self-deprecation. I come from a very self-deprecating family, you know, in our family, we all kind of teased each other. mean, everything from, you know, mimicking each other, the way we walked and talked, just did that in the family. We didn't do that for other people. It's very safe to be able to do that in a family, isn't it? So I think for me, feeling that I can be playful that's really, important to me. think, I hope it's... one of the factors that's made me fun to work with, with other people, that we know when it's obviously very serious and focused, but we also know when to have fun. Because if you can't find out when and how to have that fun, or just be a bit playful or silly or childish, then work gets really boring. So I think authenticity in what makes you you, and I'm very grateful that. through nature and nurture and my family that that sort of not taking yourself too seriously was a really important quality. I love that. from what I know about you, you are fun. Like you're really funny, easy to get on with. And I see that also, you know, kind of like trickles down into how you lead and how you engage with people. But of course, knowing when to, okay, we need to buckle up, we need to do some work, but then we can still have fun doing it as well. When you reflect on your leadership process and journey. What behaviors do you think that you tolerate that you need to let go? And how will you do it? Yeah, I think there's a very clear answer for me on that Chisom think it goes back to something I said a moment ago. I think people pleasing is probably one of my challenges. And I think there's two sides to this. One is that I just believe that there are ways of resolving conflict in a way where it can be done respectfully and we can still find some place on the page to move forward. But I think in the past, I've had difficulty letting people down or saying no or... wanted to please and that can also apply to leaders who I've reported into as much as anything else. Yes, I will do this. Yes, I will work Sunday and be away from my family to finish this deadline because I'm so eager to please or keep them happy. And I think that's something that I think I have consciously been letting go of it, but I think it's probably something that I still wrestle with. Hmm. That's interesting because I'm, and thanks for sharing, because I think a lot of leaders do not easily admit that they to struggle. And sometimes people pleasing and being a leader can be counter intuitive, right? Because you need to be able to make decisions. You need to be able to say yes or no. while holding space for people while struggling with that decision, but knowing fully well that you need to make it. So it's interesting. How do you navigate that now? Because what was it before and you've been a leader for 30 years and how did you navigate the, I want to please you, but hey, we got to do this. help me understand that. I think when I started out, mean, you my first job was in 1996, 1997. And as I said, I was sort of, you know, put on this leadership development path where it was a very different style of leadership we were talking about then. It was this extremely autocratic approach. workplace culture was, I don't even think that was a concept that anyone really very much thought about. So I think I was groomed into being this, very autocratic and quite hard-nosed. take no bullshit kind of leader. That was how it was back then. So I guess I must have had to make a whole part of my personality disappear to do that. ah And I think I was probably a lot more kind of cutthroat then we were working in the recruitment and headhunting business. It was notorious for being very hire and fire. I mean, we were having to, you we would often, I'd be told to let people go after, you know, two weeks if something had gone wrong or they hadn't performed. There some really brutal decisions made when I look back on it. So I don't know how I did it. I don't recognize the leader that I was then, except for the fact it was a very different time. Leadership culture had not evolved to what it is now. And I think I just got really good at uh masking. When you say leadership culture, because that's also something I want to discuss around, I think there is that sense that leadership culture has improved. And sometimes I see that leadership culture now has become really performative. Yeah. So no, you cannot toss water at your staff member. cannot. I mean, some people still try. You cannot be verbally abusive. But to what degree do you think that that has actually changed for the better? Or do you see it as an intersection of performance and fear? A lot of leaders are afraid of being called out, for example, or getting in trouble. Whereas maybe back in the day, they didn't give a hoot, right? Yeah, I mean, I think that I've been quite lucky in some of the companies I've worked in. The majority of the companies I've worked in Norway have, it's been a very different experience for me in terms of the leadership cultures I've worked in. My first role here, it was a phenomenal leadership culture and just in terms of everything from the work-life balance to how the leaders were to how meetings were run. And I think that that's partly been the changing times that something started to evolve in our understanding around what makes people stay in workplaces and what makes them perform. But yeah, I also totally agree with you. There's this whole level of performative leadership, which is equally problematic. But then again, you know, I think the whole apple cart has been upset again recently because we're leading, we're living through very different times and we're seeing a rise of authoritarianism and it is a bit scary to think that some of those old attitudes and leadership styles that I think many of us hoped were dead and buried seem to be making a resurgence. uh That's quite scary, actually. Right. And we both know leaders who have a wonderful public persona, but then are just vicious and zero leadership qualities internally and in how they lead. So I think that has always been present, you know, this performance I want to talk to you a little bit about boundaries. Yeah, like what boundaries have you set for yourself? in how you work. So personally or professionally, have you put in place that was uncomfortable but necessary? And I also say boundaries personally because I think it's easy to say like I'm putting boundaries at least for me personally. I'm queen of boundaries but I also need boundaries for myself, right? Like I need to say like, no, no, no, this is not okay. You're not allowed to do this either. So how do you, have you done? or implemented any boundaries that made you uncomfortable, but was absolutely necessary. Yeah, I have actually had to address boundaries around mental health in recent times. One related to burnout, overworking. But the other one, I think, related to the impact it had on my mental health when my dad died. Mmm. And I, you know, I feel so much for anyone. I'm sure you have people listening in who will have been in a situation where they've had to work and try to carry on somehow when they're going through. the grief journey and that can feel pretty impossible and pretty nasty. So I've had to really address a few things. In my case, I think for the first year I buried the grief. I was actually in a new job. I was two weeks into a new job when my dad died and I barely took any time off. Mm. But that wasn't a very good uh idea in hindsight. And I think what resulted was just this sort of unraveling while trying to do a new job, while trying to carry on as a mom and look after my family. And just ending up in a bit of a unpleasant abyss of very, very poor mental health because I hadn't really been taking care of myself so that's something that I've had to address boundaries on and you know and I think for me I was so bad at asking for what I needed at that time I was so stuck in this place of grief where you know someone that was so important in my life was no longer there, And I was so stuck at knowing how to find a way out of that. And, you know, as a leader, as someone that's been so solutions oriented, I think I couldn't handle how stuck I was on this one thing, that I couldn't brainstorm my way out of it with a team meeting. I didn't know what to do. And I think that... I lost so much faith in myself ah with that particular experience of the grief journey and how I carried on and showed up at work. That was tough. Hmm. Thanks for sharing. I mean, it's not, it's not easy to lose someone. It's not easy to lose a parent. And as someone who's also lost a parent, I understand to some degree, just how jarring that entire thing is. And you're trying to make sense of the world. And I can't imagine having to go to work and at same time, you're navigating, you have this leadership role and yeah. How do you start asking for help? You probably want to make a good impression, right? You're just starting out. So there's a lot there to navigate. And I think I also appreciate that you talk about mental health, because I think that's something that is important. think that being able to articulate a voice, how we're feeling or how we're navigating, even creating better setups and systems for ourselves to thrive, gives other people around us the permission to do the same. And I think as a leader, you know how you're able to model that behavior makes a difference for the people that you lead. Yeah. What does success mean to you now? Gosh, success for me now is having a job with flexibility. Oh, having a job, yeah, that's success. As someone who's also, lost my job through redundancies. So yeah, when you've lost a job in downsizing processes, having a job is always, that always feels like success. You know, I've had periods of being unemployed in between that. super scary when you're supposed to be at the top of your game and there you are navigating looking for work. But no success looks like having a job that can flex around my family. I think that's the crucial ingredient for me. My kids are getting older, but I'm getting at that stage where I'm realizing that I'm closer to being an empty nester than this mom with sort of three small kids. And it felt like that was my existence for such a long time. So I think the time, having time for my kids, having, you know, the flexibility to work my job around my home life, that is really important for me. That's how a great workplace or a great role looks for me. I love that. And for me, I think that resonates. I need to be able to work from anywhere and whenever I want. you know, like I keep the most ridiculous hours to normal people, you know, that I'm able to work at 4 a.m. in the morning and have the day off or travel somewhere and do something. So I think flexibility is, of course, important and money, of course, like being paid well absolutely matters as well in work. What is a book that changed your life or how you, yeah, changed the way you think? I mean, I read a lot of books. I read a lot of books related to my advocacy work. I've read a lot of leadership books, but there's one book that I often come back to and it was really life-changing for me because I think I was 15 or 16 when I read it for my GCSE English. It's a book that many people have heard of. It's The Color Purple by Alice Walker. yep. And it is an absolutely tragic, harrowing, gritty story that covers everything from intimate partner abuse and gender-based violence, violence against women and girls, particularly in the storyline. But outside the harrowing parts, it's this most beautiful story about two sisters. Hmm. And I, you know, I had a lot of Shakespeare and, and Laurie Lee and all the traditional books. And I didn't enjoy, enjoy reading those, but this was a book that captivated me. And I still always to this day, and weirdly it's a line I use sometimes, there's a line in the book, which is very central to the story where the two sisters, Seeley and Nettie, as Nettie's leaving. Celie's sort of saying to her sister, write to me, write to me. And Celie does this line that I remember at the first time I read it. She says, nothing but death will stop me. This is her reply to her sister who wants her to write as she's sort of leaving. It's such a powerful line. It still gives me goosebumps now. That book was a game changer for me. It's a beautiful story. Everyone should read it. Yeah, it's a great book. What are you aspiring to in your personal life? Less stress, more fun. Yeah, I think, you know, we're all feeling a lot of existential malaise, you know, coupled with this sort of, you know, backdrop of... slowly sleepwalking our way into extinction as a human race, the way things are going. And I think sometimes what I have to, what we have to navigate back to is this idea of where can we be playful? Where can we be fun? And what makes us life? And as much as anything for me, it's small pleasures, like, you know, potting, doing my winter pots. But it's also bigger pleasures like being with friends and having the time to sit and have laugh with the family and finding that time to see the beauty in life I guess. I love that. And what about in your professional life? What are you aspiring to? My aspirations in my professional life are that we get Operation Smile Norway on the map. We've achieved such tremendous things in the last 12 months. We've just funded our first program in uh DRC, which was really, really gratifying for us because it's extremely complex doing surgical programs in the Democratic Republic of the Congo right now. it's given us a real boost to see the tangible outcome of, in that case, the program that we were able to send funding to was for young leaders between 15 and 18. And we were, we had a long chat with our colleague in DRC who talked about how important it was. for young leaders to still have hope on the horizon during very, very difficult times with war and with conflict. So we want to get funding for more programs like the one in DRC. We've got 13 programs that we're funding altogether. So. one's done and 12 more to go. But of course we have to spread the word, people have to love and understand what we're doing and we also have to show people the impact of what we're doing and for us like with anything it's rooted in the long-term capacity building in local areas and this idea of system strengthening and we're even moving more strategically towards looking at hospital infrastructure. So beyond just the free surgery, we're looking at how we can really benefit and provide more for the communities that we work with. Love that. Okay. If you could speak to the young girl you once were, what would you say to her? goodness me, that's a really good question. I would tell her that all of her rejections in life will end up being redirections. I'd tell her to hang on to her kindness, but to be vigilant, to keep an element of vigilance about her. I'd tell her to cherish the time with her family, especially her parents, especially her father. And I'd tell her... that she's going to make her proud one day as well. Love that. How would you like to be remembered when it's all said and done? How would like to be remembered? I I want to be remembered as someone who made a difference, who made a positive difference, as someone who showed up, who was always prepared to roll up the sleeves and help people where they could and support people where they could. And I think I would like to be remembered as someone who who was fun to be with. I think I quite like that too. I think that would be important to me. love that. All right, well thank you for sharing Astrid and thank you for being here with us. Really lovely as always having a chat with you. same, thanks so much and you know I'm really loving listening to Overnight Wisdom and such such an honor to be a guest on the podcast so... Now you get to listen to yourself. All right, thanks Astrid. Thanks, Chisom - Thank you so much. 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