Ep. 19 Breaking the Silence on Coercive Control with Patricia Romboletti

 Show Notes:

In this episode of Healing Doesn’t Have to be Heavy, Angie and Pat Romboletti explore the concept of coercive control, particularly in the workplace, and its parallels with domestic abuse. The discussion highlights the psychological impact of job-related trauma, the importance of recognizing these patterns, and strategies for healing and reclaiming personal power. The speakers emphasize the need for awareness, support, and community in overcoming these challenges, as well as the significance of setting boundaries and building confidence to navigate toxic environments.

 Bio 

Author, Tedx speaker, Bulletproof Your Career coach, and creator of the 4-Step Bulletproof Your Career Methodology—because today, you can outperform and out-deliver, and still end up out of a job. 

After almost two decades as a retained executive recruiter, Pat switched sides and exposed the secrets behind the hiring curtain. She has coached over 900 executives globally and uses her expertly crafted Bulletproof Methodology to give her coaching clients an unfair advantage against a rigged and frustrating hiring system. And her From Onboard to Bulletproof program will make sure they never again say, “I didn’t see it coming.” 

Her four-phase system - Clarify, Eliminate, Prioritize, Accelerate, gives her clients a bulletproof mindset, a shortened search, a lifetime of financial security, and control of their career and destiny. Her TEDx talk was a wake-up call for corporate executives, urging them to stop living in complacency and denial and to disrupt themselves before they are disrupted. My advice — “think and act like a gigger.” 

To connect with our guest, click on the links below: 

LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/patriciaromboletti 

Website: Bulletproofyourcareer.com 

🎁Grab your Free 4 Monday Mindset Videos: https://patricia-romboletti.kit.com/4a0a942d36 

Connect with me:

Website:  https://angieberrettmovement.com/

Instagram:  https://Instagram.com/angieberrettmovement 

Facebook:  https://www.facebook.com/angie.berrett/ 

YouTube:    https://www.youtube.com/@angieberrettmovement 

LinkedIn:    https://www.linkedin.com/in/angieberrettmovement/ 

TikTok:       https://www.tiktok.com/@angieberrettmovement?_t=8qP9poCboWA&_r=1

🎁Grab your Free 5 Minute Playful Move for Instant Calm: https://angieberrettmovement.ac-page.com/free-short-movement-sequence-for-when-you-are-overwhelmed

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:01

Hello, everybody, and welcome back to the Healing Doesn't Have to Be Heavy podcast. I'm your host, Andrew Barrett, and I am a trauma-informed coach, a plenty expert, a registered nurse, and I'm also a child abuse survivor. As I was on my journey healing from child abuse, I felt the weight of the heaviness of having to slog through the trauma and the healing in order to get to what I thought was going to be hope. And as I made it through my journey and as I tried so many things, I discovered the power of play and of movement and helping to release the trauma from my body, finding joy, finding fun, and bringing some lightness to my healing. And now I get to coach women on how to use play and movement to connect to their own bodies, releasing limiting self-beliefs, stress, anxiety, tension, depression, and trauma, bringing more fun, more joy, more happiness, and more healing into their lives. And this podcast is a way to do that. I'm so honored to be able to speak with incredible guests who have amazing stories, uh, fantastic insights, and wonderful little nuggets of information to help you on your journey to maybe find healing in ways and areas that you didn't expect. And today's guest is no exception to that. I'm so excited for y'all to meet her and for you to hear her take on healing from trauma and where trauma may show up that you might not be expecting it. But before I introduce her, I just want to give a quick trigger warning. We're gonna be talking about mental health problems, mental health struggles, coercive control, um, abusive relationships, and even job-related stress and trauma. So if you find that you're getting triggered, definitely step back, ground down, do some sort of um actions to come back to yourself. And then I really invite you to come back because our guest today has some insight that blew my mind and I'm hoping will help blow your mind in a good way as well. And then some resources to help you navigate that. So definitely take care of yourself and then stick around till the end because she has a special gift for you, and so do I. So stick around till the end for those. Um, you don't want to miss it. And so, without any more conversating on my part, and conversating is an official word today, I want to introduce you to Pat Romboletti. Pat, thank you so much for being with us today.

SPEAKER_01 2:32

Oh my goodness, thank you for having me. What a what a wonderful platform to come and share a message that I've wanted to get out into the world.

SPEAKER_00 2:39

I'm so excited to have you. We talked a couple weeks ago, and I have just been so anxious. Um, like I said in the intro, you blew my mind when we talked. And I'm so excited to share you and your insights with the listeners today. So tell us a little bit about who you are and what you do.

SPEAKER_01 2:56

Yeah, so uh you you got the name, Pat Rambletti. I have uh a book called Bulletproof Your Career. Uh I have done a TED talk, um, which is about uh actually it was called the gig economy, but it really is fed into the Bulletproof uh methodology. I spent the early part of my career in sales and sales leadership. I then became a recruiter, and now um all I do is work and coach with executives, and I have a membership platform that I do most of that work on, although I do some one-on-one. Um my work is different. It's I do not call myself a job coach because that's not the issue. Um, what I'm doing is helping people take control of their career. Um, and they have mostly kind of delegated that out to corporate America for many years, and now they're realizing, oops, I've given the the wrong puppet master the control. So my work is to, yes, I absolutely help people land in if they are in transition, help them land. But where my work really starts to differentiate is from the moment they land forward, I spend a lot of time with them coaching to make sure that they never ever ever ever have to have a gap again and that they really take control. And in the process, what they tell me is, Pat, you not only taught me to take control of my career, but you taught me to taught me to take control of my life as well. And that's where sort of this comes in. Um, when the intersection I see is that I don't just drop people off at the doorway and be cut at at the office doorway, and because I'm working with them, I see things that maybe other coaches don't see from the perspective of the vantage point of the of the candidate or the executives sort of um champion, if you will. Um, and and so that's that's the beginning of it. My uh people come to me because of my philosophy of you can out you can outperform and outdeliver and still be out of a job. So you better have a different strategy than you had before.

SPEAKER_00 4:50

Okay. Um tons of stuff. And I love um so for any of you listeners who are thinking that how does job relate to trauma, we're gonna get into that. There's a really, really big correlation. And so um, how did you get into this work? What what was your journey to get to where you are?

SPEAKER_01 5:09

Yeah, um, I think it well, I guess it started when I was eight years old, quite honestly, when the uh two boys next door, same age as me, were getting into trouble all the time. And their mother would say, you know, go out there and play. And we would sit down on the stairs and I would coach them. And I didn't realize where that was going to go. And then when I was in sales, um, all my team, instead of calling me the boss, they almost always called me coach. So it was almost like being fed to me, right? Um, so then how I got exactly where I am now is when I was a recruiter and I saw the dysfunction in hiring, and I saw that people thought that companies were still able to keep promises that they used to make and be able to keep and can't do that anymore with all the disruption. I decided to switch sides and really take people behind the curtain, help them understand what's going on, let them know that if they do outperform and outdeliver and they're out of the job, it's not them, and help them in many instances heal, which we'll talk a little bit about today, and then move forward in their career in their work and career that they do.

SPEAKER_00 6:08

Amazing. So talk to us about you started to talk into it, healing um with work. How that seems like such a contradiction. How how do you do that? What do you see that needs to be healed?

SPEAKER_01 6:24

It's it's interesting. It's a contradiction because it's so hidden.

SPEAKER_00 6:27

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 6:28

In other words, it people are embarrassed to say and and and when they le lose a job, even though they know I outperformed out-deliver, I lost a job, they still blame themselves. And it takes a long time and and a coach to help them see, wait a minute, there was culpability on both parts here. And matter of fact, you did absolutely nothing wrong, right? But I think the idea that what I what I really try to work when I'm start my my work with them is there's a lot of healing to be done because they they walk in one day, they hand them a box, they turn off their email, and they say you're done. I mean, there isn't even we we have a life where we need transitions into things. They get no transition, um, and they cut them off from all the people that they knew. Right away, you have trauma just because they're cut off, right? Um, so it varies anywhere from, hey, I'm resilient and gritty, and I can, I'm uh I'm bigger than this and can move forward all the way up to the other end. And this is where we started into really intersect and things because there's people that come in and they don't even realize I coined a phrase called PJSD, prior job stress disorder. Because I saw people who, when they went back to their new job and I was trying to onboard them, they were kind of constantly looking over their shoulder. And anytime their current boss would say something that reflected back to the really difficult boss that they had in their last job, it would almost like send chills down their spine. And I thought this is this is exactly the response that people get from prior stress. This is absolutely happening. Um, and then further on, especially more recently, I've absolutely seen folks that really hit on our topic, which is it's it's beyond just micromanaging, it's coercive control at its at its definition in a domestic environment is showing up in the workplace. And and just one side note before I um move on with that is I think it's showing up more aggressively and more vividly since COVID. And the reason is that when you have a micromanager who likes to control, and coercive control is an extreme extreme version of control, but it's still control. Um, and and they can't see you, they can't, you're not in right in front of them. They get paranoid what's really happening, are you really doing the work? It brings out the worst in somebody who's a controlling micromanager kind of person. Um, so we've seen that, and I think that has caused this to accelerate. And they also get away with a lot because there's nobody around. If they're screaming, yelling, or bullying somebody on the phone and and and threatening them, who's gonna know except for those two? So it's a lot of environmental differences that have caused it, I think, to to be um really come out again. But I can definitely see that what I have seen, um, did a little bit of studying of months ago on coercive control, and I went, that's going on in the workplace, and hardly anybody's talking about it.

SPEAKER_00 9:21

Yes, and that's why I'm so excited that we're gonna be talking about it. So, coercive control in the workplace is not just for people who've lost a job. This can be for anybody. So, how would you define, I know you started to talk into it, how would you define coercive control in the workplace?

SPEAKER_01 9:37

I wanted to I want to start with defining it, if you don't mind, coercive control in general, right? Absolutely. I'll give you the very textbook definition is it's a pattern of controlling manipulative and intimidating behaviors used by an abuser to gain power and dominance over another person. Now, typically that that is in talking about a domestic, right? And and it's just like anything else, it's nonviolent and and leaves no marks, right? So that's what that is. Um, it is in the I'm gonna go over some of the things. Let me go over a few of the things that happen in a relationship. And as I do this, people listening will the bell will go off and they'll say, but that's what's going on in my workplace. So it's it's starting here, you're gonna hear it there. Um, isolation, cutting the victim off. It says cutting the victim off. So in the workplace, what does that look like? You you don't you get excluded from meetings, you get excluded from information. There's things kept from you, and you feel like everybody knows something but me, and I feel very isolated. So that's that's like a one of them. Um surveillance and monitoring. Hey, I'm gonna check all your emails, I'm gonna check you come in. I'm gonna you are gonna be so micromanaged that lunch will be an issue for you, right? Um, financial control. This is where I see it with with folks that I coach. Um, you need me, is there is there a way of it? If you don't have this job, you're not gonna be out on the street. And they and I I have tended to see this higher um happen more often to um single moms.

SPEAKER_00 11:10

Oh yeah.

SPEAKER_01 11:11

Because more at stake, I can and it's almost that's how they pick their victim. I can control that person because they're single, they're a single mother, they're the sole owner uh or or earner, and if they don't do what I say, they're gonna be out on the street and I'm gonna keep reminding them of that. So that is huge, and it's true, right? They can they can disrupt it like that, right?

SPEAKER_00 11:33

When you have a boss that's in control of your finances and you getting paid every two weeks, every month, whatever, whatever it is for you, absolutely that's a form of financial control.

SPEAKER_01 11:43

Totally. So the other symptoms are well that you see in domestic is humiliation and and gaslighting. Happens all the time in the workplace. All of a sudden you're the one being called out in the meeting. You've you have made a minor mistake and you get shot down for it on a call or in inside of a meeting, and a whole lot of gaslighting goes out. A whole lot of gaslighting goes on in that. Well, I never said that. I I I don't did you remember me saying that? I don't remember saying that, right?

SPEAKER_00 12:08

Did you take it that way? I just meant to totally to bring it up to help everybody be aware not to do that in the future. Right.

SPEAKER_01 12:16

And and you know, you take it that way a lot. There must be something going on with you. It couldn't possibly be me, right? Um, so and then there's there's the threats, as I said, with the it you think bosses can threaten people? Absolutely, and not just in job loss, not like I'll report you on this, I'll make sure that they hear about this, and and things that they're never gonna do because it's not gonna show them up, but they still can say it, right? And then just the the whole, I'm gonna make rules for you and and squeezing in the the um the micromanagement to down to just you have a wiggle room of zero at the time that you're through, right? Um, and so and then here's the other thing is that what's the impact on the victim in those situations, right? Loss of autonomy. Same thing that happens at work, exactly the same thing that happens with a boss that's doing that. Um anxiety, of course, depression, yes, physical, all the physical, um, that even when there's no physical abuse, the physical that shows up in that you're not sleeping, you're not eating right, you're a nervous wreck, all of those things show up and your whole life starts to fall apart, right? That's what happens in domestic, and that is exactly what happens in the workplace. And in the workplace, it's seen as your dysfunction.

SPEAKER_00 13:31

You mean you it's seen as the worker's dysfunction?

SPEAKER_01 13:34

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 13:35

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 13:36

Because the gaslighting going on over here causes that to happen. So I'm gonna go down to HR and talk to them because I think you might have you might need some some help and you might need this. And then no, don't talk to HR. Well, you know, I it I I've seen people uh uh working 16 and 20 hours and going home and sleeping three hours to come back because they've got to get that done. And if you don't get it done, I'm gonna have to re you know, we'll have your review. So just think about um it's it's the second area um where someone can have unbelievable control and it's exactly what they do, right? Um, so it's it's it is the same almost. I've got I'll I'll give you some corollary. Um, give me one second to get, I want to, this is so important to me. I want to get the exact um uh research that I did to drive the corollary for you.

SPEAKER_00 14:26

Absolutely. While you're pulling that up, I just want to say when you and I talked, so I'm a registered nurse for everybody listening, worked in healthcare for years, and healthcare is one of the most toxic abusive environments that you can be in, I think. Um well, okay, because I'm peak speaking from personal experience. So it becomes normal, it it's normalized for it to be that way. And so talking about it and bringing this up, I was like, oh my gosh, I spent 20 years, no wonder. Like I was just replaying my trauma patterns. And so for those of us who have abuse in our past, we may not recognize that this is an area where trauma is continuing to happen.

SPEAKER_01 15:10

Totally. And and I noticed something that much like um, as you and I spoke in in my I have worked as a volunteer in battered women's shelters. It's a cause that is um something that I I've I've always been drawn to. Um and there's an a pattern with employment that is a pattern that I noticed in when I was working in the shelter, which is they will be with a a coercive controlling boss. They will finally break free. Most of the time they do eventually get fired because of the control and the power. Um, and then the next role, they find the same kind of boss. Nothing has changed with them. They haven't seen what's going on, and they, and to your point, what you just made, they have created that's the normal. That's the way bosses treat you. So when this boss starts showing that, and and I believe that they get targeted in an interview process, like, ah, this is somebody I can control. This is somebody that I can get away with with this. Um, they would never try to hire me, I can tell you, if they're in the coercive control. Um, and they would know the type that's gonna go, oh, come on, right? But they see somebody who's already been beaten down a little, they'll just keep that up. So that also, which of course I saw in in working the shelter tends to happen, is that exact same thing is happening, right? I did find the the the parallel thing, um, which is in, you know, so intimate relationship. I think that the workplace is an equivalent of pretty darn intimate relationship. Absolutely. Yeah. Um you get isolation from support in the in the domestic situation. Um, and and on the other side, it's you know collaboration, no, you're not gonna, I'd like to be in a mentoring program. Absolutely not. You're your your work isn't up to par with that. Um, surveillance, we talk about tracking and check-in, um, and then um emotional degradation, public shaming, criticism, and belittlement. It's huge, huge in those that are doing this. And I want to stress that there there is a marked difference. We're not talking about um an occasional uh bully boss. We're not talking about somebody who has bad days, bad weeks, you know, bad times. We're not talking about somebody's under undue stress and they're blowing up and they're they've called you out in a meeting that they haven't been doing. This is it's consistent. It is so pervasive that hardly a day goes by that the behaviors that I'm talking about are not um, you know, foisted upon you. So it's it is far beyond what you, if you're in there thinking, well, my boss is kind of nasty to me right now. They can be, but this is much more controlling. And I think, you know, we talked a little bit in the in the uh in our first discussion about I don't see this being um talked about much in the human resources group, right? I they have workplace violence prevention programs, etc., but it's more the physical. I don't think that this is seen as much. And I think that the um they can't hide it. The if there's violence, you can't hide it, you're right. Um here, I think that the HR is is used as a threat to the employee instead of like going there to get help and support. That's made to think, don't you dare go to go there because you're we're gonna be reporting you, it's gonna hold you back, and then I'll have to be turning, you know, pay papers in. And they just they make it up, of course, to scare them. But instead of that employee, where normally, if it's not that intense, they would go to HR and say, look, this has got to stop. They are intimidated so much that they don't even do that. They don't feel safe doing that. Not at all. That's the whole thing. Their safety, this is to the level where the employee's safety is is. And and I had a recent situation with um a coaching, somebody in the membership, went through this, and um, even though a sec a good uh opportunity came along and it was gonna free her from that, at least on the surface, it looked like it wouldn't be um as controlling as what she's in, it took her forever to decide. And one of the things that's an outgrowth of this beating up and control is you you lose such confidence in yourself. You don't trust yourself when people are telling you everything's wrong, you don't trust yourself to be able to make a good decision. You you don't trust yourself to that this work will never be enough, and you're constantly overworking and overthinking and throwing it away and coming back again. Nothing's gonna be enough. What do I do? But it makes you even think, should I really leave? I mean, this he tells me that, or she, it's mostly he, he tells me that this is, you know, the best place for me and that I'm the he's the best thing that ever happened to me. That could be worse. So it causes, even when there's an exit door for them to get out, they sometimes will stay behind because it's it's the devil you know, versus being threatened by it's not going to be any better out there. Not the way you work with your behavior, you can't find anything better, and nobody will pay as much as I do.

SPEAKER_00 20:00

Oh my gosh. I just I'm blown away thinking about how um traumatic and traumatizing work environments can be. It's just not something that we talk about. Um and work most of us work what? Uh a work week in the United States or in the West is 40 hours a week. That's a large quantity of time to be spending with somebody, or even in an environment, even if it's not one boss to an employee, if it's the whole structure or system um is very hierarchical, very domineering. That is just constantly creating that trauma.

SPEAKER_01 20:41

Um more opportunity for it, right? Or assignment, I'm gonna give you an assignment at 6 30 at night, and I'm gonna say, I need this on my desk at 8 a.m. First thing in the morning. I now control the the whole rest of your day and night, and I'm gonna make sure you don't get any sleep and you're gonna be weakened, and I'm gonna get more control over you. It is, I see it. I mean, that is not an accident that that assignment comes at the very last minute when somebody is in this state. And again, occasionally those things happen. This is when when you see that that wasn't life or death, you really realize that that assignment really wasn't, but you're so in it you can't see that. No, that was just to control you day and night. Most trauma, most folks in with coercive control in the workplace are working 50 and 60 hours a week. That's that's the additional problem, right? And there isn't much relief in in the company. And in a couple of instances that I've coached, the CEO was the perpetrator of coercive control. Who are you going to go to when it's that? And my answer to them was I want you to understand what's going on. And I want you to understand that there is no, there's nothing we can say that's going to change this. We just have to get you out of there as quickly as possible with as little damage as possible. And my goal always is to stay where you are and let's let's find something first, because it's going to be much easier for you to find a job. And I'm going to comment on why this is so important in this instance. But in general, it's much easier to find a job when you have a job. That's just well known in the workplace. But imagine if you come out of there with PJSD, you have no confidence, you're you're you don't think that you can talk correctly, you don't think you can do anything right, you are not going to show up well in interviewing. So if you're still working, and so you add to that that lack of confidence, if you're not working, that's just another confidence blow. So it makes it harder. So I always try to get people to stay where they are. Um, and I'm I'm coaching executives. These are not like some, this is not somebody who doesn't have gravitas and presence. And even sometimes a like a mid-level or even a senior level manager can be involved in coercive control with anybody, could be the CEO, could be the the anybody in the C suite that is their boss. Um, it can happen for sure.

SPEAKER_00 23:00

And I'm gonna bring it down even out of the executive suite, it can happen even to uh especially to people who are not in the executive suite. Exactly.

SPEAKER_01 23:10

I I share that to say yes, don't think that it's exclusive, but you're absolutely right. They will tend to go to to use that on um first on people that are very um shy. So I find it happens most in finance and in technology. Those tend to be left-brained, more um, I don't consider um uh um shyness is is something that can be overcome. It's not introversion. People can use the two, right? But you'll find a lot of um introverts and shy people will go into um roles where there isn't as much requirement to have lots of interaction with the customer outside. Like I just want to do my job, right? Those are the folks that 10, I find tend to be victims of this. There are some exceptions for sure, but that's a tendency.

SPEAKER_00 24:04

Wow. So amazing. Um, so I just as you're talking, I'm thinking about all the times where I've had, you know, in my professional career working as a nurse, I've had a doctor talk down to me, or you know, be disrespectful, be minimalizing. And not just one time, but it's the constant over and over and over hospitals. We have to sacrifice, you know. Um, I'm thinking of in terms of nursing, that's my realm. So that's where I'm gonna talk as as you've been talking through this. Um, nurses are praised when they don't go to the bathroom for a 12-hour shift, when you give up your own, you sacrifice yourself to take care of the greater good. And that that's not healthy. Like that's not an environment where you're being valued. Um, and so it's it's things that you may not recognize, like I said earlier, that have become normalized that you may not recognize are actually micromanaging, microcontrol, coercive control. And it may even be coming from your peers.

SPEAKER_01 25:07

Oh, for sure. Absolutely for sure. That can that can be part of the gaslighting and and and every bit of that. Um, and it is that when you start to realize I'm not sleeping, I'm not eating right, when it starts to impact you physically, and I there was um uh another person in the membership last year who um had started a new job and it was not and it was in the healthcare space, it was not in a hospital, but it was not going well. And um at first, you know, I coached her through here's some things you can do, and really be very clear and be very document what's going on, but document things to them. And you know, so we made some little adjustments, and then I I would check in, I say, it's not changing. So here's the thing. And she said, I'm Pat, I'm not sleeping, I'm not eating. I said, That's it. This is the cutoff point. When it affects you physically, you have to get out of there because it's only going to be a down rules pile. And yeah, I think in hospitals, there's always that the doctor is, you know, the god of gods, heart surgeons, and they are, they are, they have their life, other people's lives in their hands. I get it. Um, you'll find it in in legal law firms, law firms, yeah. Um, where there's the the managing partner and the the highly um educated executive and um the who acts out with this, which is kind of a um totally a control, totally control. And and and for those listening, I want I want you to be thinking, okay, wait a minute. If I'm going, you're you know, I'm hearing this, yeah, you're right. I do get isolated, I do all of these things. Um, and and it doesn't happen at home. Why am I putting up with it? But I also want you to be thinking, yeah, I'm getting all that. And I'm experiencing that at home too, and I'm accepting it in both places. And um I would say that would be a good time to get get help, get guidance, put your foot down and and find a way to go forward from it because you shouldn't have to live that way and you shouldn't have to work that way. Um, and I and it would be heartbreaking to me to know that somebody had that 24-7.

SPEAKER_00 27:01

Absolutely. So, how do you start to work with women, uh, but people in general who are starting to wake up and recognize, oh yeah, I am in a work environment where there is coercive control or it's a toxic environment and it's not healthy for me.

SPEAKER_01 27:17

The the first thing, it you know, depending on when it pops in, because that's not the that's not the purpose of my my or my group, but I'm very much into mindset first and then all the rest is second. So that's why it comes up for me, right? And so when people are in a new role, um, I tell them, and and that's starting to happen, to first of all, first of all, I try to prevent it from the beginning because I really have them set really strong sort of ground rules with their new manager. And if they won't accept, like I want to meet once a week and I want to be sure that I understand at all times where do I stand, where can I improve? Like, and if if they resist that, then they're setting themselves up to set you up. So be conscious of that. Um, I do tell them when they start to see that it's already going on with that first person who I said, first try to find someone in the organization that's been there for a long time that doesn't seem to have, you know, doesn't come into the crosshairs of that person and talk to them about how they've been able to come unscathed from that behavior. Like, like what are they doing differently and what could you do differently? So, first get some coaching from others around you. If they can, you know, have some confidential discussions with HR. I I think the issue is I I've coached HR executives and I've asked a few recently, you know, did uh do you understand? Have you ever seen coercive control in your workplace? And they don't even know what I'm talking about. Yeah. So it's not front and center. There's a little bit of it. Um, it's very it's much more understood in in England. They actually have laws against it. I mean, they're much better in out of this country and in England in particular in the UK, but not here. Um, so it is try to find those things and then try to realize that um that their threats, they they don't really want to lose you. If they lose you, they can't use you. So they don't really want to lose you. So put small, it's always start with the tiny boundaries, you know, like I must leave on Wednesdays at seven. And I had somebody, this worked really well. Like, I can work these nights, I must leave at Wednesday on seven. I have this obligation, and it's start to set that one boundary, and she started to see that that she survived that, and then she started putting other boundaries in place, which really started to help. I will tell you that it's it because of the way that I think about being in control of your career, that's not something you want to get good at managing. It's something you want to get away from.

SPEAKER_00 29:41

Setting small boundaries like that?

SPEAKER_01 29:43

No, the the job itself.

SPEAKER_00 29:45

Oh, the job itself, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 29:46

Don't get good at managing your manager away from coercive control. Um, but I want you to get, I want you to do enough so that Wednesday boundary, what does that do for you? When she did that, I said, you know what we're gonna do on Wednesday when you leave on time? You're gonna start working on your um resume, we're gonna start working on your interview skills, and we're gonna start working on your networking so that you can get out of there and get to something different. So the boundary was also to create the bandwidth to get someplace else. So that's the other thing is like you're not just you're gonna take back time, and part of that time um should be used to getting out because it's not going to get better, right? It's not because people aren't recognizing it.

SPEAKER_00 30:25

And many times people don't want to change. The people in the positions of power don't want to change. And so it's working to build your self-esteem back up again, because most of us have probably been pretty destroyed, um, who were in coercive environments, both at home and at work. And so to believe that you have the worth, the value, the whatever. So take that boundary and like you said, work on your resume, work on building up that self-love, that that belief in yourself.

SPEAKER_01 30:56

She actually took up Pilates, which was one of the yeah, that Pilates, I think, was a was a big, huge help. Um, but yeah, that that is a big deal. And the and the issue is we do have a workplace where a lot everybody's been in a company or a situation where somebody got away with murder almost because they were the they were the big they brought in the big money or they had they had something the company needed and they were protected. So that's why they got that power. They were untouchable and it showed up in everything that they did.

SPEAKER_00 31:30

Oh my gosh, so amazing. So then as you work with women, how what do you do to help them develop the confidence to to believe they deserve something different and then start to find that?

SPEAKER_01 31:44

Yeah, so that is the number one skill to work on is confidence. Because when you have the confidence and and it's a skill, it isn't, you know, it's not something, it's a skill. And the more you get, you know, you set that first boundary, and then you get a little bit more skilled at setting the next little boundary, the next little boundary. So that's virtually all that I try to focus on. And and I have lots of um, you know, uh books and resources and things inside the um the membership, which is again, it's a it's a career membership, but this has got to be nipped in the butt or it's gonna go on. So it's all kinds of personal work development and just realizing every little step you do that you do, that little thing that you don't want to do, it could be like I'll say to them, just send that one email, one email this week that you've been hesitating to send and see that nothing blows up and nothing comes back. And oh, that was okay. So it's so it's always those little timing steps. If if um one of my favorite books is a book called Atomic Habits by James Clear. Um and it's very known. It's it's one of the biggest, I think it is the number one selling book of all time in in corporate in business. Um, and why that is so good is that the premise of that whole thing, um, it's not strictly about confidence, but what it is about is how much can happen, how much one one little thing can lead to a big transformation one little step at a time. And that's what this situation needs. But the biggest, the biggest thing is to um to to focus time on confidence building as well as um interviewing and the other skills, like that one skill. Um, it's so important in the in the um interview process. I do encourage a lot of journaling. Um talk to yourself, have a conversation with yourself on paper. That's the way I think of journaling, and just tell yourself what it what you need to tell yourself. Um, and it's amazing once you it won't happen the first time or the second time or the third time, but after a while you'll start talking to yourself. I heard somebody talk about that, and I thought, you know what that reminds me of? It's like the first time you get invited to a hey, the three of us are going to have coffee. And the first time you go to have that coffee meeting, um, you're kind of shy and you're kind of quiet and you're kind of just listening, you don't have much to say. And then the second time a little bit more, and then you know, eventually, maybe it takes a month, and then all of a sudden you're coming in and you're greeting everybody, and then pretty soon you're opening up. That's the way a journal is. And the first time you open that blank piece of paper, it's like going to the coffee meeting and you're the new kid on the block, and you just look at the page, you don't quite know what to say. Um, and then over time, next thing you know, you're finishing other people's sentences. That's what will do for you. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 34:24

I love that. And I love how you talk about starting with one small thing, and because as we're healing from trauma, whatever form of trauma, workplace trauma, domestic trauma, intimate family, um that weight, that heaviness of of trying to go from zero to a hundred is just paralyzing almost. And so starting with one small thing, setting a boundary for Wednesday night at seven, or you know, journaling or whatever it is, starting with that one small thing sounds like I'm interpreting, is one of the rays of hope that you give your clients is you know, when you do that one small thing, it gives you that courage, it gives you that sense of I can do this and allows them, you people, anybody listening, to start to stack things, one small thing on top of another.

SPEAKER_01 35:19

And and I think another thing that I focus on a lot for everybody in all my coaching is authenticity. And when you start journaling, you're really becoming yourself on paper, right? That's the real you talking to you, right? And when your authentic self is sitting there being beaten up and the gaslighting and everything, your authentic self starts to go, that's not right. That's not right. But you have to be coming from your authentic self, not the self that that person has tried to turn you into.

SPEAKER_00 35:50

So powerful because for those of us who are not in touch with our authentic self or our authentic self feels really disconnected, and we've become that fawn um person, or that that um I always called it, I said that I was a puppet um and a puppet master was controlling me. Um that's what it felt like to me, who I was, based on what everybody around me wanted. So that puppet doesn't get to feel it's normal for that puppet to be feeling that way. And so when you do start to tap into that sense of authentic self, you're able to realize, nah, this isn't right. This doesn't feel good. I'm feeling comfortable.

SPEAKER_01 36:30

That's right. The real me doesn't like this. I think the thing that that is so um for me frustrating and and uh it's we're a long way from this transition. But in the workplace, just like outside, you know, somebody will say, be talking about something they'll say, oh, it's all your imagination. Maybe it's your sister, your mother, somebody, you're just imagining that he's he's a wonderful guy. Don't stop that, right? Same thing. That kind of gaslighting goes on inside, and as long as HR isn't questioning it, and I'm not I'm not doing this to vilify HR, it's just it isn't out there in the open. It and when I start talking to some really well-seasoned and really good HR executives, and they haven't heard that that discussion, I'll say, Do you do you have um programs about violence in the workplace? And yes, and and all of that, but not that. And so you start to think you're crazy because you're you're sharing it to everybody, and they're going, Oh, I I don't know. He's just he's a micromanager. It's like, no, this is beyond that. That's just who he is. Exactly. That's who he is. Well, who he is is making me sick, causing me to lose sleep, and these are some of the things that are beyond just being who he is, right? And if he is that, he's not a leader. So we need to do something about that, right? So I think that I'm um, there's so many, so, so many people that come into um and I think it where it really hits them is they do, they outperform, they outdeliver, they lose their job, and they go, what was all that about? What was I doing? Why was I letting them do that? Right. And and again, it is it is often men, it is not a hundred percent men. No, uh, so I don't mean to to s make it sound like that. I think that's important because I certainly have coached folks where it was not. Um, and and I actually I in one instance, a very, very close relative of mine was working in in a legal environment and um really really all of these symptoms, all of these symptoms, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 38:30

So yeah, women can be the uh uh the conversive controller as well. Yeah, it's this is not gender specific.

SPEAKER_01 38:40

Yeah, yeah. And it's not like like don't here's what somebody said, well, I should just be, you know, I I I mean maybe I'm threatening her or threatening him is like your existence is threatening them. So don't don't don't don't don't go there because that's gonna make you more supplicant to them. I don't want that that to happen, right? So it's don't don't challenge because that they're using that as an excuse. Um, and again, everything that I when I'm talking about this, it's really what can we do in the meantime until you can exit that environment? And then the focus is let's exit that environment and and not put you in another set um environment where it's very similar. And um, and one of the tests of that is when you're interviewing, is you know, what are your regular communication channels here? And how do you do you meet weekly with somebody? And you start you start asking questions about the the the meetings and the and the transparency without using the word transparency. Um and and when you're kind of observing how they react to that, when you hear, well, we meet when it's necessary, who determines it's necessary? Guess, right? Right. She said, Well, I asked if we could meet, and he said, Well, meet when when it's needed. And I said, It's only going to be needed when he when the person wants to deflate you or do something, so that's not gonna work. You've got to go back and get a time. And then and then it Well, he's in the he can only talk to me from the car. How convenient. How convenient that that's his that's his time to talk to you. Nope. Has to be either on Zoom or face to face. No in the car kind of thing. Um when you have somebody who's already exhibited a whole lot of control.

SPEAKER_00 40:18

Oh my gosh. Pat, I could talk to you for hours about this because it is it's so fascinating to me how we're talking about coercive control and narcissistic abuse. Those are buzzwords that are being talked about in home and family of origin, that type of environment. And we're not talking about it in terms of work. And yet we spend so much time at work. And so having a plan, having a resource to help you develop a plan to find something else is so important because trauma is trauma. It shows up in your body. And like Pat has been saying, when you start to develop the physical symptoms of it, you're already down that trauma pathway. And so finding an exit strategy is imperative so that you don't continue to re-traumatize yourself.

SPEAKER_01 41:10

Yeah. The sooner the better, because that PJSD, that prior job stress disorder, kicks in very quickly. And if that keeps carrying, you know, the next job, you're gonna walk in looking over your shoulder. And when they say you're gonna stay late, it can both have you trigger, like, oh, I gotta get out of here already, or you know, it's just one, it's a one-off, but you overreact. That's the number one thing I see with PJSD.

SPEAKER_00 41:33

Oh my gosh. I so incredible. All right. Now you have a gift for our listeners. What do you think?

SPEAKER_01 41:40

So one of the pieces of my work that's most important to me is the mindset work. So yeah, resume, interviewing, relationship building, all of that, but the mindset work. So in my membership, the the folks in the membership, every single Monday, they get a two to three minute maximum. It's actually one to three minute Monday mindset boost. And it's just a a recording that I do for them on a particular topic. Um, so I'm offering, I have a new program that we just introduced a few weeks ago. It will be um that your I'll we'll have a link in your show notes that people can sign up. They will get four of those Monday mindset videos free. Um, and they can listen to them, they can keep them, they'll have access to that hub forever. So they can keep replaying those four. If they if they love them and they want to get more, want get one every week, and if they want access to the entire library of that, which are broken into playlists like Lift Yourself Up and Um Fear and Hesitation. So we have a playlist for them. Um, there will be, there is already over 120 videos in there. So then they get access to that for$52. So for one of your but the gift is take the four, if that's all you all you have, and play those over and over again, you'll be great. And then you have the opportunity for the rest.

SPEAKER_00 42:51

Amazing. Um, so we'll drop that link in the show notes. Definitely go grab those. And if any of this has resonated with you, I highly recommend you go grab that link and start to listen to it because the more you can break free and recognize that you might be in a toxic environment, a coercive control, a traumatic environment at work, then the sooner you can start to come up with a pathway to exit out of it and to the the idea of the Monday mindset is to brainwash yourself in a good way. Yeah, and to to build that self-confidence to give you the courage to get out and to find something else. Yeah. I love it. Also, down in the show notes, I'm gonna drop if you're feeling that angsty, anxiety, emotional, itchy, need to peel your skin off, feeling I've got a free short, less than five-minute movement sequence that you can do that'll instantly shift your mood, allow you to step back and to release that energy, step back so that you can start to think more clearly. Because when we're in that overwhelmed fight or flight state, we can't process things. And so that five-minute movement sequence that I've dropped also in the show notes, will help you to release that energy.

unknown 43:58

Great.

SPEAKER_00 43:59

All right. So, Pat, I'm gonna ask you um, what has been your biggest struggle on your journey and what helped make it lighter?

SPEAKER_01 44:08

Uh, well, I can tell what uh it's hard for me to think of a struggle because I just see life every day as just getting up and seeing what's in front of me. But if I think about what's helped me along the way, it's it's always been my community, my best friends, the people around me. It's it's relationships. I've lived in seven cities and I have little pods of relationships in all those cities. So it's certainly the people. Um, I I I truly think that not have I not had good times and bad times, yes. But I didn't see them as struggle. My philosophy is I that got me to the next level after that. So that's just how I see it. It's a stepping stone, no matter how bad it is. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 44:44

I I love the community aspect. We do, we heal with community and having people around us that lift us up is so powerful and heavy times easier.

SPEAKER_01 44:53

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 44:54

So then my question, kind of the opposite, would be if we could sit down in 12 months and talk, where would you want your journey to be that it's not now?

SPEAKER_01 45:02

Um, I would like to reach hundreds of thousands of people with the messages that I have. And that's not an easy, even in this era, it's not an easy chore. I feel like the work that I do, not just making people aware of mindset and that connectivity, but the really guiding people to realize that they have to take control of their career. Nobody else is going to take control for them. Um, and that work and the and the bulletproofing after they land, I'd love to reach a millions of people as a matter of fact. So that would be it, just a bigger, bigger audience.

SPEAKER_00 45:36

I love it. Oh my gosh. It's so incredible and just so mind-blowing um to think that many of us are re-traumatizing ourselves in our workplace. And Pat's offering a pathway out to help you find and to create an environment that is more conducive to helping you find that self-confidence and self-love.

SPEAKER_01 45:59

Awesome.

SPEAKER_00 46:00

And a career that you enjoy.

SPEAKER_01 46:02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 46:02

All right. So, Pat, how else? Um, if people want to get in touch with you, what's the best way for people to get in touch with you?

SPEAKER_01 46:08

You know, I'm all about LinkedIn. So my LinkedIn profile, you can look it up just uh Patricia Romboletti on LinkedIn. That's the best place to to intersect with me. And on there you'll see a couple of um, there's uh items on there that the features that are some uh free, there's a free uh um document about how to how the workplaces change, how the the processes change. So there's some good things on there. So that's that's the number one best place, and I'll take you to everything else.

SPEAKER_00 46:33

Fantastic. We'll also drop that in the show notes. So um go connect with Pat. If you if anything even sparked for you, definitely go check her out because um things are gonna come to you a little bit more and a little bit more as you listen to what she's doing.

SPEAKER_01 46:49

Don't forget my TED Talk too. That's a really good place to get a that just just search my name under. We'll put the link here, but it's on YouTube just under uh TED Talk. Not on the main TED Talk, it was a TEDx here in Atlanta, but um I think that's a good introduction to the philosophy.

SPEAKER_00 47:04

We'll also drop that link in the show notes, so definitely go check out her TEDx talk. Fantastic. Well, Pat, thank you so much for coming on. Thank you for sharing your wisdom and for bringing insight into an area that that people aren't talking about enough. So thank you for sharing this with us.

SPEAKER_01 47:19

Thank you. Thank you for it. You know, you just made part of my wish come true because I want to reach more people. So being on this podcast gives me a little step towards that. So thank you.

SPEAKER_00 47:28

You're oh, my pleasure. I'm so glad to have you. So for everybody else, until next time, be thinking our little seeds and nuggets getting planted in your brain about maybe ways that you can find lightness and release some of the heaviness on your journey. And until next time, have fun, enjoy, and find some sparks and some hope. Bye, everybody.