Leading as a Trauma Survivor | Your Trauma Wise Career Guide Ep 16

Leading with Trauma: Empowering Leadership for Trauma Survivors

In this insightful episode of 'Your Trauma-Wise Career Guide,' host Cyndi Bennett dives into the often overlooked intersection of trauma and leadership. Cyndi, a trauma survivor and informed career coach, alongside returning guest Holly Dillon, explores how trauma history can shape and influence leadership styles. They discuss the unique strengths and challenges trauma survivors bring to leadership roles, such as resilience and empathy, as well as potential pitfalls like micromanaging and people-pleasing. 

The conversation covers critical topics including how to recognize when trauma is affecting leadership, ways to build self-awareness around trauma triggers, and practical advice for new leaders navigating their roles while honoring their healing journey. Cyndi and Holly share personal anecdotes, practical tips, and strategies to help trauma survivors turn their experiences into leadership superpowers, emphasizing the importance of self-care, regulation, and building trust within teams. Tune in to learn how your trauma history can be a powerful asset in your leadership journey.

00:00 Introduction: The Untold Side of Leadership
00:51 The Strengths and Challenges of Trauma Survivors in Leadership
01:45 A New Conversation: Leading While Healing
02:20 Welcome to Your Trauma-Wise Career Guide
03:08 Interview with Holly Dillon: Managing with Trauma
04:04 Recognizing Trauma's Impact on Leadership
09:44 Common Trauma Responses in Leadership
16:44 Developing Self-Awareness and Regulation Tools
20:40 Building Trust and Support Systems
25:45 Taking a Leave of Absence: A Personal Story
28:25 The Importance of Self-Care for Leaders
29:11 Communicating Your Absence to Your Team
31:22 Advocating for Your Needs Before Burnout
33:49 Fact or Fiction: Assessing Leadership Concerns
38:46 Curiosity in Leadership
40:10 Advice for New Trauma Survivor Leaders
42:17 Setting Boundaries as a Leader
45:23 Regulation and Co-Regulation in Leadership
52:17 Final Thoughts and Encouragement

When you're ready, here are 3 ways I can help you grow your career journey:

1. Free trauma-informed career development resources from my website! Visit https://www.cyndibennettconsulting.com for always up-to-date tips.
2. Ready to build a fulfilling career with trauma-informed support? Join The Resilient Career Academy Learning Community, where trauma survivors support each other, share resources, and develop career resilience in a safe, understanding environment
3. Ready for personalized trauma-informed career coaching? Explore my range of virtual coaching packages designed for different stages of your career journey. Visit my website to find the right support for where you are now. [Visit my website: https://www.cyndibennettconsulting.com/1-on-1-coaching]

DISCLOSURE: Some links I share might contain resources that you might find helpful. Whenever possible I use referral links, which means if you click any of the links in this video or description and make a purchase we may receive a small commission or other compensation at no cost to you.

Transcript

Leading as a Trauma Survivor | Your Trauma-Wise Career Guide Ep. 16

Cyndi: [00:00:00] There's something we don't talk about in leadership development. We teach people how to manage budgets, how to run meetings, how to set goals and drive results. We give them frameworks for decision making and strategies for team building, but we never ask the question that matters most. Who were you before you became a leader?

See, here's what we've discovered. The most effective leaders aren't the ones who've had perfect lives. They're not the ones who've never faced adversity or struggle. The most effective leaders are often the ones who've been through something difficult, who've faced trauma, who've had to rebuild themselves from the ground up.

But here's the problem. When trauma survivors step into leadership roles, they bring incredible [00:01:00] strengths with them, resilience, empathy, the ability to see around corners because they've learned to be hypervigilant, problem-solving skills that were forged in crisis, but they also bring something else, triggers, hypervigilance that can turn into micromanaging, people pleasing, that prevents them from having difficult conversations, the need to prove their worth by working themselves to exhaustion. And nobody talks about this. Nobody teaches trauma survivors how to lead with their history, not in spite of it until now.

Today we're having a conversation that the leadership world has been avoiding. We're talking about what it really means to lead when you're also healing, how to turn your trauma history into your leadership [00:02:00] superpower, and why the business world desperately needs leaders who understand what it means to be human.

Because the truth is this, your trauma history doesn't disqualify you from leadership. It might just be exactly what makes you the leader your team needs.

Welcome to Your Trauma-Wise Career Guide. I'm Cyndi Bennett and this, is a conversation about leading with your whole story.

Did you know that trauma impacts how we navigate our careers? But most career advice ignores this reality. Imagine feeling confident and safe at work while honoring your healing journey. Welcome to Your Trauma-Wise Career Guide, the podcast that reimagines, career development for trauma survivors. I'm your host, Cyndi Bennett, a trauma survivor, turned trauma informed career coach and founder of the Resilient Career Academy.

If you're navigating your career. [00:03:00] While honoring your healing journey, you are in the right place.

I want to welcome back Holly Dillon to Your Trauma-Wise Career Guide.

Welcome Holly.

We are talking about what it's like to manage with trauma. So having a trauma informed leadership as a leader. And that's what we're going to talk about today. Welcome back, Holly, since our last time.

Hello. We're really enjoying these conversations and having these conversations, and talking with you about trauma-informed workplace and trauma-informed leadership, and, really enjoying having this time with you.

I'm going to ask you some questions around what are some of the main challenges that a leader who has trauma experiences in the workplace so that we can help people [00:04:00] understand, if I'm a new leader, what do I need to do? Or how do I need to show up? So the first question is, how do you know when your trauma history is affecting your leadership style?

Holly: Well, a lot of times you just don't know. And so what's interesting, for my own story, 

first of all, is I knew about my trauma, but I spent 40 years having no idea that it was actually me. So I knew about my trauma, I knew I had trauma, but the way mine showed up then, and I think a lot of people show up this way, I was going to be 

High functional, so I was type A. I had to do everything right, not extreme perfectionism, but pretty close for myself. That would show up. And one of the best things that ever happened to me is I had a peer who shared with me how I was showing up sometimes.

So, the first thing I would say is, hopefully, you have some trusted advisors at work, or a [00:05:00] trusted employee who feels safe enough to share with you how you might be showing up. Now, how they explain it to you, you could say, well, I'm the boss and that's how it needs to be, but if you really did some self-reflection, that's what I would say is really listening to feedback.

Feedback is a gift. I believe that to be true, but only if you're willing to turn on your ears and hear what is being said to you, and then be able to go self-reflect on that and be like, why is that happening? Why am I hearing the same thing over and over and over again in my feedback?

Those are clues, maybe in your reviews, the same feedback over and over, or you try to get a job and it's declined, and it's the same reasons. Those are big messages to sit down and try to figure out why could those things be happening. So that's number one, is hopefully somebody gives feedback, in some sort.

Another one is, [00:06:00] if you go to work you feel a certain way about a certain task, a certain person, maybe you're getting a pit in your stomach, just thinking about having to go into a meeting with a particular person, a lot of times that is a trauma response. And so reading, being able to feel it in your body, acknowledge it, and again, have some mindfulness of what is going on. Does that person remind you of somebody? Does their mannerisms? Did they have a previous experience with you where they weren't kind and they embarrassed you? I mean, it could be so many different things. So listening to your body.

And it could be the same around a task, maybe there's a task that you are procrastinating consistently, you don't want to do it? Ask yourself some of those questions and if you're not good at being able to self reflect, maybe journal. Because when you start to journal and just write, you know, the topic is, why don't I want to do this task? And you just start [00:07:00] to write without perfectionism. Go back and read it, usually the answer's in there. It just seems to be the answers in there almost every time.

The other thing, listen to your gut, especially for women. You know, we say we have this gut instinct, but then we ignore it. And it's, a lot of times, our nervous system sending us messages unconsciously, and it's showing up in our gut. So listening to your gut is real. So if something doesn't feel safe, what's going on? Listen to your gut.

Unable to concentrate at work, that's a big one. If you just can't concentrate, you know you're losing concentration constantly, that's a big sign.

And then the last one is, how am I acting at work? Am I over the top? So if i'm showing up hyper aroused, right? So I am frustrated, I'm quick to anger, I am making quick decisions without thinking about it, just things that are maybe [00:08:00] getting me into trouble or my team into trouble as a leader. We could talk about this topic frankly, for a whole another topic, because there is so much in it. 

Cyndi: I think sometimes too, managers or leaders experience burnout, right? Because they're trying to be perfect or they're trying to do all kinds of remedial, workarounds, for their trauma.

Holly: Yeah. And to that point, it's easy to say, well, everybody's burnt out, and so it is tough. How do I determine if it's, I'm burnt out like everybody else is because we're overworked, understaffed, or is it my trauma showing up? And so you have to really, again, dig, deep, be brave to ask yourself the questions, because some people don't know they have trauma. That's a whole different challenge, 

Cyndi: Hopefully, this will be an avenue to help [00:09:00] people understand, "oh, if I experience this, maybe I should consider whether or not this is trauma history. Because when your leader or your peer gave you feedback, did you associate that with trauma, even though you knew you had trauma?

Holly: No, it took me another 10 or 15 years. I just took it as my personality. Always blame, it's just my personality. 

Cyndi: Exactly. And so that's what happens a lot of times though, in the workplace. That's why I talk about it because we don't connect the experiences that we've been through, the trauma that we've been through with behavior in a certain area or a certain environment. All right. You ready for the next one? 

Holly: Yeah, 

Cyndi: Okay. 

Holly: Sure.. Bring it 

Cyndi: What are the most common ways trauma shows up in a leadership situations? 

Holly: Yeah, This one again, we could spend, I think we might need a whole nother session. One of the things we talked about, I think just a tad about our window of [00:10:00] tolerance. And as an individual we have a window of tolerance, and there are certain ways we show up. So if we're dysregulated, hyper aroused, a couple of those things is keeping busy. I can't stop. So I might volunteer my team for every project there is out there. I might volunteer myself or I go to work, I work a 14 hour a day, then I go play ball, and then I do this and I'm in first thing in the morning and I stay late. Why are we keeping so busy? It's usually because it's our numbing, our way to stay numb. That was my jam for sure. That's how I lived for, and it makes for a great employee, and so you're rewarded for it. Which is more difficult, because you're rewarded, you're promoted and it makes it look great, but you are the one that may suffer, or your family may suffer in the end. 

Cyndi: Busyness is definitely a coping strategy.

Holly: Coping strategy for sure. You know, are you showing up, maybe micromanaging. So this is another way, over control [00:11:00] or micromanaging your team to the point that they can't even do their job. What's the point? You may hear. What is the point of me having this job, if you're going to change what I do, if you're going to correct everything I do, if you don't trust me. , It's again, listening is so key here because you may be micromanaging your team, which is no fun for anybody. And if you put yourself into their shoes, you don't want to be micromanaged.

So you hear feedback that's, I'm just going to kind of stick to this feedback because this is typically how people are going to know, right. You may hear you're difficult to work with. Ouch. Right. is not a badge of honor. Some people might consider it a badge of honor because they think it might make them a strong leader. It is not. And so you want to dig into that feedback. What makes me difficult to work with and hear what they're saying.

You know, you may not be able to hear difficult [00:12:00] messages. You know, one thing I had to do a lot of work on, and to be honest, I never really got the answer, but it was about feedback and I was always very open. Give me lots of feedback. I want to hear it. And I didn't get it. It was very frustrating. I wouldn't get it. And I was really asking for how can I improve? I definitely always wanted to do that.

And someone said to me, is it safe to give you feedback? Now, I believe as, especially as I went on in my career, it was, but I bet early on, maybe not so much, right? I probably showed up defensive. I probably had excuses. I don't know, to be honest, but that's what I'm guessing. because I've had managers where sometimes it wasn't safe to give them feedback. No one's going to do that then. Is it safe to be able to give you feedback?

And then the last thing is, how's the morale on your team? Is there cohesion on your [00:13:00] team? Are they productive? Because if you have a team that's disrupted, a lot of times that may be because of the way you are leading them. And so checking in on how your team's doing and put yourself, is there anything you might be doing to cause some of the disruption? And again, we could talk about this for a whole hour easily, so maybe we put it on one of our sessions

Cyndi: Well, I was a manager for about a minute, and I really enjoyed it because for me, I , enjoyed taking care of my team. That what I enjoyed. I enjoyed developing them. I mean, I'm a career development coach, so I enjoyed the process of coaching and developing the talent, but I struggled with not knowing how to motivate or, get people to do the things that were hard. This is kind of like my story [00:14:00] about the babysitter, you know, when you're young, I was a young person, sixth grade, I think, and I was babysitting my brother and my sister, right. So, you have all this responsibility and no power, right? And that's sort of the babysitter mentality you don't have any power, and so you use like control and force to force people to do the things that you do. And so we don't have the skills then. If that's what you've learned as a child growing up, then as a leader, you go back to old strategies that you used in the past in order to control people to do the things and force people to do the things that you need them to do as a leader, right? And so if that happens to you as a leader, you might have a trauma response. I'm just saying .

Holly: Yeah, yeah. Control definitely doesn't work very well. 

Cyndi: It doesn't. [00:15:00] It's really not a good leadership strategy. And also it leads to frustration, especially when that other person is in fight. Like if they are resisting for some trauma reason and you're going head on and you're just batting your heads together, that's not going to work well. Right. That's not a good leadership strategy. 

So being aware of how we show up and how we manage and handle difficult situations too. 

Holly: Well, I think that's a good point. We've talked about this I think on the last session of knowing what your default threat strategy is. Are you a fight? Do you go into fight or flight ? Because as a leader, you need to know what kind of leader you are, what your trauma response. And that will start the conversation of what kind of leader you are. There is nothing wrong with either of them, because there's lots of tools, but knowing do you go into fight or flight or freeze, is super key to being a good leader. It's just, here's how I work [00:16:00] now, how am I going to incorporate that? Because you're most likely not going to change that threat response. You're probably not going to change it, but to be aware of it make you such a better leader.

And whether you have trauma or not, I would just say, just to throw this out there, you still have a default threat. So if you're listening to this, you're like, well, I don't have trauma, I'm listening to it for a different reason, every single person has a threat response that they default to. 

Cyndi: And when you've practiced that a lot, there's a very well-worn neural network that follows that. So your brain is always going to do the easiest thing and it will do fallback. So are you ready for the next one? All right. How can leaders develop self-awareness around their trauma triggers at work? 

Holly: Yeah, I actually wrote a couple notes on this one because it's good. The first thing I would suggest is to build your own Board of [00:17:00] Directors. So, you know, a company has a board of directors, hopefully, as a CEO, they have a personal board of directors, but even as a leader of any kind, have a board of directors.

And what I, mean by that it's people you can trust, especially at work, right, this is your at work board of directors, because you might have them in different areas. People you can trust that will give you, honest feedback. If you go sit in their office and go, "woohoohoo, did I blow up in this meeting. I don't even know what to do. And I don't know why." They can talk to you about it. Or, you know, my best thing was having people on your team that feel safe enough to talk to you about it when you've really shown up maybe in the way you don't want to.

Because if you are aware of it, you can actually circle back, and this is a Brene Brown term I love, being able to circle back and do it again, have a [00:18:00] conversation over again, apologize, 

Cyndi: Repair. 

Holly: give tools, whatever it is. Repair. Yeah. Rupture, repair, whatever that looks like. You know, be honest with yourself. I think I've said that a few times now. In just all these examples, you've really gotta have the courage to be honest with yourself first of why you're showing up a certain way in order to make adjustments.

So learn regulation tools. So learn how to breathe before a big meeting. Learn how to journal, if that's what you need to do. Whatever it is that helps you regulate. have a couple tools always at the ready, whether it's some grounding techniques or breathing techniques. So at any given time, you can go into that tool set, just immediately to give yourself a chance to stay regulated. 

Cyndi: We do have the Handy Dandy Workplace Trigger Tracker toolkit that we can link in the resources below. That is [00:19:00] good for managers and employees alike to know for sure, when does this show up for you in whatever role you're in. 

Holly: Yeah. Thank you for that plug. because it is fabulous.

And then the last thing, some people are going to be like, ask for what you need. 

Cyndi: Ooh, that's a big one. 

Holly: Ooh. Ask for what you need. And again, we could probably spend an hour on that session of how does one ask for what they need? And so I'll give a very fast story. I don't think I've talked about this before, but I got to a point, I had to take a leave of absence so I could actually get better and get healthy.

My trauma had finally come to a head and I wanted to keep my job. I was a manager of a lot of people at the time and luckily I had the most amazing manager ever, and it was a male, and I had to have a call with him. Now, to be honest, I had already made the decision I was taking the leave because I was checking myself into a [00:20:00] trauma program and it had, that was done and dusted. So it was not really asking for permission as much as this is what I need to do.

I would say my belief is eight outta 10 times, people are going to give you what they need as much as they can. They will do their best to help meet your needs. And in this case, I went fully prepared, I had already set up a backup for myself, because I had someone on my board of directors, that I could trust to step into my role. It was all set up. I basically said, here's what I need to do, here's the solution when I'm gone, this is what I think's going to happen. And it was easy .

Cyndi: So I have so many questions about these two scenarios that you had. So, one is you talked about board of directors. And for trauma survivors, learning how to trust people to show up for you, especially if you have these deep-seated attachment wounds, right, to have people that you trust, to show up for you is [00:21:00] difficult. So, how, as a trauma survivor, who's now l new in leadership, maybe a new leader, how, do you begin to develop those types of collaborative working relationships with people in the workplace so that you can establish this board of directors, because I don't want to say go do this, and then not tell them how to do it .

Holly: One of those things is you're probably putting yourself out there a little bit, and I get trust is hard, so you want to tiptoe maybe into it. So first of all, you'll know kind of inherently who you get along with better, who do you feel safe with, who do you have some things in common, not trauma related, but outside of work. Are you a parent? Can you talk about kids?

How I made some of my best closest friends were on business trips. That actually is probably where I made [00:22:00] most of my relationships. You're traveling together and you're thrown on a plane together, and all the things that go with that, or you're in a car together, you carpool. So you do need to be able to put yourself into some situations. If you stay isolated, the chances are probably very slim. So put yourself in a few situations where you can still feel safe, you can give yourself a chance to develop some connection with people. So that's number one.

And then, you, know, with your staff, you know, who's showing up, you know, who's coming to you and saying, how else can I help? You, know the people who you've asked to do something and they've either not done it, probably don't trust them, or those that you can always count on, and it might not be immediately, it may take some time, so this is not something you're going to walk in and all of a sudden, especially if you're new to the organization. So a lot of it is time, spending time each other and being willing to talk about things [00:23:00] outside of business. It's a typical sales strategy, right, you walk into a CEO's office and you're looking around the office to see what do I have in common? What can I have a conversation that's not about the thing I want to sell them? A typical first thing you learn in sales 1 0 1, I think, is how do you build rapport? And so it is some work around that.

So if you get some opportunity to do leadership training, this might be one of the things you want to do, is how do I build rapport with people if you have not had a chance to do it before.

Cyndi: Well, I think too, for trauma survivors, really pay close attention to your body, your physiology, because we have this proprioception that helps us to know, we can walk into a room and know who's having a bad day, who can we trust, who do we feel comfortable with, who's safe enough. Our bodies will tell us that if we're paying attention, right? We have a sense. It's that sense that we have, and it's [00:24:00] really highly evolved and very practiced and attuned to different situations. So as a trauma survivor, pay attention to that, and start there. That's what I would recommend, start there with your physiology and knowing, okay, is this person safe enough? And then all the things that you said around building and learning how to connect with people.

Holly: Yeah. and you know what? One of the reasons people get coaches, and they don't even know they're getting this out of it, is to learn how to be in a relationship. So sometimes with a therapist, there's a little bit of a power differential still, but with a coach, we really go at it as a peer. Now, not all coaches, I can't speak for everyone, I can speak for Cyndi and I we go at it as a peer relationship and some people have never felt unconditional love and we give unconditional care, love. We are your board of directors. And maybe that's who your board of director [00:25:00] is. You get a coach you trust first and that's your first person. That's very possible. I've coached some people where they'd be like, I've never had anybody that I that you know everything. And I show up and tell you because there's this trust, and it's not just about confidentiality. We are set up because we care. And so I think that's a way to start if you're starting from scratch and zero of trusting people. It is important though, I don't want to sugarcoat this because as a leader, if you're going to be a leader, this is one of those skills. matter how hard it is, you've really gotta skill up. 

Cyndi: And that's fine, right?

Holly: Yeah, you can't be a leader in a silo. It will be hard to be successful. 

Cyndi: I want to circle back. I'm going to do a go back card, right, because you shared your story. Thank you for sharing that, and being so vulnerable and transparent with us about taking a leave of absence, because I have a lot of folks who have had to take a leave of absence and there are many [00:26:00] questions for them. Like, how do you know you need to take a leave of absence? How do you know that it's gone too far? Or you can't recover back to where you need to be in order to be effective. How do you know that? And then how do you ask that without feeling shame or feeling some sort of guilt around I can't handle it. That mentality sort of pops in on us. So can you talk about how did you know that you needed to do this? What were some of your thought processes that got you to that decision and did you have that sense of feeling like there was something wrong with me that I need to take care of? 

Holly: Yeah, there's about two pieces to this actually. So by the time I went, I hit rock bottom in my personal life. My personal life drove this decision and [00:27:00] there was no choice. So it wasn't so much my work life, it was my personal life drove the decision that I needed to do this. And so, there was no question. I didn't feel shame because I was so desperate to go at this point. So this was 2010, it wasn't as today, especially in the United States where you can go to trauma programs, you can find so many. I didn't even know they existed. So when I found out through my own personal therapy that there is a place you can go to walk in and say, this happened to me, now help me understand how I'm showing up, because of this thing happening to me, which is a whole nother thing. It was a, I need to go and I need to go right away. There just wasn't a lot, can I figure out the money and then I'm going. So I went into the situation where, if they said no, I was probably going to have to quit. But I just knew they weren't going to say no. I just knew they weren't going to say no. But I was at a point where I was going to have to leave then, I couldn't do [00:28:00] it. So that was my scenario in that case. I'm hoping nowadays, there is programs like ours and tools and more coaching and just more communication about this. In fact, I know it's factual that people are taking a leave of absence sooner. They're just, they're taking leave, sick leave now, especially after COVID, people are taking leave now. So yeah, this is a deep one. So, you have one person to fix period. You get one life, one chance, and when you are ready, you'll know you're ready. And, strangely enough work, won't matter as much, because you are so desperate when you're finally ready to get the help. 

If you can make a plan before you leave, so you don't leave your team high and dry, if at all possible. That definitely helped me feel good about leaving, as I had already picked the person who was going to step into my role and trusted her a hundred percent. [00:29:00] She was already on the team, so she could just move up. It was just a no brainer, which gave me so much relief. And my boss, frankly, because he trusted her, because I trusted her. So to be able to maybe set up what it's going to look like when you're gone. Can you tell them how long you think you're going to be gone? Do you just need a break because you're burnt out, or are you checking yourself into a 3-month program? Like what do you think's happening? What's going to happen when you get back. And I did not tell all the details to my boss. Now he knew high level. I told him high level because, I was finally at a place that there was no shame about my own experience. I didn't do anything wrong, it was done to me, and I had gotten to that point where like, okay, I'm now going to take responsibility and take care of it. But it wasn't something I did. My boss, could take this information, feel sad for [00:30:00] me, don't get me wrong, it broke his heart for me. But it was OK tell him. And I also trusted he wasn't going to go tell everybody else. Not everybody knew why I was out. It wasn't like I blasted it on an email why. So you don't have to tell all the details either. You can just say, I'm taking some time out, this is what I think my plan is.

Cyndi: I want people to hear that doing that as a leader demonstrates the importance of self-care and taking care of yourself, and the fact that you're stepping out and doing the hard thing is actually leadership. It is leading your team in prioritizing their mental health so that it will benefit not only them, but also the team.

Holly: Yeah. And back then, it was a long time ago, people weren't doing that. I don't know [00:31:00] anybody that did that. Nobody. And nowadays, again, it's, happening a bit. But if you, as a leader, can say, I need to take a leave of absence, and are there things that you can demonstrate you tried before you had to take the leave of absence? See, this is the thing is so many people wait until they're rock bottom and then you have no choice. So the other suggestion I would make, and it goes back to what we talked about, ask for what you need before you have to take the leave of absence.

Be an advocate for yourself before it gets down to that. Take your times off. Take your vacation. Tell your manager you need an extra three to days for a project. Ask for what you need before it gets to the point where you're stuck. 

Cyndi: And I think this is where a coach can really be helpful, because a lot of times we don't know what we need. to be honest. We don't know what's going to help. We don't know what's going to fix it or, if we get suggestions from [00:32:00] someone maybe who has lived experience with, Hey, I had that situation too and this is what I, asked for. That is so helpful, to have other people that can help provide alternatives to a pick list, if you will. 

I do a lot of lists in resources for folks to say, Hey, here's a list. Here's a script. Here's some choices that you can make, a buffet of choices that you can choose from and select, so that you don't have to figure it out on your own. You don't have to do that as a leader.

Holly: Yeah, and whether it's a coach or your board of directors practicing, role play with somebody, whether it's your spouse, a friend, It doesn't even matter. Worst case scenario in the mirror, but role play how the conversation's going to go. If you're asking for what you need, just role play it and ask someone to [00:33:00] be there so you can actually say it out loud, because sometimes the fear is so desperate, it will stop your voice, and if you've just practiced out loud, you'll realize, Okay. that wasn't so bad. And then even make assumptions of how they're going to respond, so you can ask more questions. It's just, again, writing yourself a script that you maybe have practiced once or twice. Otherwise what happens is you get dysregulated, you lose your mind in a meeting or at your manager, and now you're dealing with maybe a performance issue instead. So not asking for what you need can easily turn into a performance issue that frankly, might be your fault, because you didn't ask for what you up front.

Cyndi: That kind of transitions into the next question. How do you differentiate between trauma response and a legitimate leadership concern? I. 

Holly: Yeah. well, first of all, figure out what it is, what what happened. Again, we're going to have to go back into what happened and then [00:34:00] my favorite tool, one of my favorite tools is to play fact or fiction. Okay. So let's say you think one of your employees has done something and you are giving them the message that, that is not acceptable in some form or fashion, and they're pushing back. Play fact or fiction. Did they do A, B, or C? Yep, that's fact. Or did you assume they did it, or did you make up that they did it in your head, or did you tell yourself a story they're going to do it. But what are the facts? And when you look at those facts, is that acceptable at work? Is it acceptable in their role? Was it acceptable at this company? And if it all says No, those things were not acceptable. It's most likely not a trauma response. It's leadership. Now, if you are making up stories about what someone's doing or going to do, or making assumptions, or maybe you just don't like that person and you've decided you just don't like the way they showed up into a [00:35:00] meeting, that may be a trauma response.

Cyndi: That's a Brene Brown thing, right, the story I'm telling myself about you is... right. 

Holly: Oh, a hundred percent. And fact or fiction is one of the things when we're working on expanding our window of tolerance, we're such big storytellers. You know, and everybody tells stories and then our inner critic gets involved and tells us stories. It's a hard piece of our work that we have to do is to be able to identify what is real and what is not. And if you can do that, I, think you can trust your leadership ability. That would be my feedback.

And also second thing, run it by another leader, somebody that you trust, another manager. And go, you know, Suzy Q did A, B, and C. You don't even have to mention their name, but they did this thing. What would your response be? That's another great way is asking some other managers what their response would be.

Cyndi: Yeah, it's so interesting. [00:36:00] My mind keeps going back to this scenario with one of my direct reports way back in the day when I was managing, and the scenario was that she was going out on maternity leave and when you have one person that manages one particular process and they're the only ones who know how to do it. And so the challenge was getting her to document and to train this other coworker while she was going out to do the things. And I think she was feeling, like she was going to be replaced. I mean, this is just, you know, looking back at that, but there was a definite resistance to her providing this transition coverage, teaching training for this other person, and, and not wanting to do it, but also a desperation saying, hey, you can't, leave [00:37:00] her not knowing how to do this really important process. So I look back at that , and I think, oh, now i'm thinking that would've been a really good thing to talk to my manager about to say, Hey, I'm dealing with this situation with this person on my team, and she is really resisting doing this transition piece. How would you recommend I handle it? Or, or what would you do? Right. I didn't think about that because, to me, at the time, it was really personal. And I took it really personally. Again, which is a trauma response, right? 

I say these things because this is real life situations, right? This is, I'm not trying to hide this crap, like this stuff happens, and this is how we become aware of it. And we're like, oh, maybe I could have handled that differently. And now that I've had some healing under my belt, I, I would [00:38:00] have. To say, oh, isn't that interesting that we're experiencing this, and to really create some distance between, who I am as a person and a leader to the situation and the scenario that is happening. So that could also help as well.

But knowing if you're taking something personally and you think it, it means something about you when your direct report is not doing what they should be doing or resisting your leadership, you might want to get curious about that. You might want to get curious about why that's happening or what's happening for you, or take your own inventory to say, what's happening in me when this happens?

Holly: yeah. Leadership and the word curious go really well together. I like that actually. I think people go into leadership thinking, I have to know everything, and that's just not true. It's not even remotely close to being true. And to be able [00:39:00] to stay really open and curious as a leader will just only make you a better leader. 

Cyndi: And it helps. It helps your team, right? Because you don't set yourself up for the anxiety that is related to having to know all the things. 

Holly: You have a team. The best leaders have a team that know more than you. The best leader always have people that know more than you on their team. I, I've worked with people who they had to be the smartest person in the room and it was painful to work for that kind of leader. But when you work for a leader that is like, oh, you all are definitely going to know more than I am. And in certain industries, that's how it will be anyway. because you may have a team of technical people that know a hundred different technical things, you'll just never know. So be curious. So you can also learn a little bit about their job, just enough to have a conversation to build rapport. It goes back to that building trust and rapport. Be curious. I love that you brought that word up.

Cyndi: I love that. Curiosity is key to really being [00:40:00] able to understand someone else. To have judgment is not helpful, but to have curiosity is. So, it's a big part of the process.

Alright, so, what would you tell a trauma survivor who just got their first leadership role? This is a big one, right? Anybody who's a leader has always had a first time, and a lot of times people are promoted to the role of manager or team lead or whatever it is because they're so good at what they do, but also they're not equipped to lead or they don't know how to lead, or they're just really good at performing what they do, and now they're plopped into this where it's not their thing, it's not their jam. Right. So then, what do they do? How do they handle it?

Holly: Well, the first thing I would say is, I'm going to go back to what you Just said that, you didn't do, [00:41:00] which is go to your manager. So your manager knows. So who knows? Your manager. Your manager hired you, believe them. Okay. So whatever they said, they hired you, for it believe them, and be real open to saying, here's what I don't know. So I, I think back to my first manager job, right off the bat, like within a month, I hired somebody and it went real bad, real quick. Things happened that should never have happened, and I had to deal with all that. Had my manager not been there to guide me, I don't even know what would've happened. And that. was my first big manager role. So using your manager and the HR department. Again, that board of directors, and you may not know them well enough to trust them, but these are people who know what they're doing enough to guide you in that first year. Ask to be sent to a leadership class or a manager training. Get all the training you can. You won't use every single thing, [00:42:00] but go to these events because then you're in those events with other managers, right? You're at the table talking about scenarios.

So ask for what you need... training on how to be a manager.

Boundaries. Boundaries, boundaries. I can't stress this enough. I think a lot of managers fail initially because they want to make everyone like them, and they don't have enough boundaries. So figure out some boundaries that can be balanced, right? To protect you, to protect your team. 

Cyndi: Explain what you mean by boundaries as a leader. 

Holly: So if I'm a leader, the team goes out drinking every Friday night, am I going to go? I may go, I may have one drink or have a diet Coke, whatever it is. Maybe I'm not a drinker, but do I not go, if they invite me? I may go for an hour, but I'm not staying all night tying one on and [00:43:00] getting drunk with my team. So that's just separation, physical boundaries and maybe topical boundaries. It doesn't mean you don't go, because again, you want to build some relationships, and the way you do that is spending time outside of work, so that's okay. But you're a leader now, you're not one of the team that's going to go out. and spend all night partying. So that's just a first example.

How you behave at work, right? You're not going to sit around and talk crap about your leadership. I mean you may, but you are setting a really bad example. So what you talk about, there's some boundaries in there that, you know, maybe the leadership is not the best, but you don't need to talk to your team about that. You've got other people you can have those conversations with.

Cyndi: So not sharing your personal feelings about your leadership as a leader.

Holly: Yeah. And that's a tricky one, right, because there's times when it is so obvious that things are bad, [00:44:00] and so then they may be like, well, you're such a corporate person or whatever, they're going, I can't trust you. So there, is a balance, but as a new leader, you might not be skilled yet to balance, so just err on conservative.

Cyndi: Well, there there is something about, acknowledging discomfort, as a leader. If something was totally wacky in the leadership and my leader denied it or didn't address it, or didn't even acknowledge it, I would feel gaslit by that. But if that leader said, you know, the leadership is not perfect, they're doing the best they can, and how can we manage this? That would be different, that's a different conversation. But to deny that there's even an issue, for sure I would not take that strategy as a leader.

Holly: Don't deny the issue, but just [00:45:00] how you word it. And I think, like you said, it's how you word it. You have to come to the table with different words. And a lot of times we talk trash because we're dysregulated. So, as a new leader and you know that maybe you haven't been the most regulated person, it is on you to learn regulation skills. A hundred percent. It is your responsibility and your responsibility only because you are going to be triggered more. It's just going to happen, because you're going to have experiences with so many more people, whether it's clients, executive leadership, your staff, your skip levels, if, depending on your role. It is your responsibility to learn regulation, whether you get a coach, a therapist, read books, go to sessions, go to yoga. Whatever it is for you, but that is on you. And I don't even want to sugarcoat that because nobody can really do it for you. And here's the best part, if you learn good [00:46:00] regulation for yourself, what's going to make you a great first leader is you're going to learn to co-regulate with your employees. Maybe you were one of them and then you got promoted that puts a whole spin, maybe your brand new to the company that puts a spin. If you can regulate each individual person initially by calm yourself, it is going to go so far. That's another one, is learn how to regulate yourself first so you can co-regulate.

It is all about the oxygen mask here. Put it on yourself so you can put it on all the others as you're working with them.

Listening to feedback is another one. Usually when you're a new manager, you're taking over for someone else. Listen to where they're at, meeting them where they are. And when we say that as a coach, meeting you where you are, that means however you show up today, that's where I'm going to meet you. I'm not going to expect you to jump on the bandwagon with me right away. And [00:47:00] you might still have some grievances from the old manager or the old manager is your bestie. You love that manager and had so much loyalty to them, and now someone coming in. Really listen to what your team's saying.

Treat people individually. I think this is a big one, is treat people as individuals. So for you as a trauma survivor, you may want to just group them all and treat them all the same, because it's easier for you. As you manage the way you want to manage versus how they need you to be a manager, if that makes sense. And I think that what I learned is every person has their own individual story, their own individual needs, hear what they are, and treat them all individually, you know, as people, not as a, big group of people. 

So that's just a few. Again, this is another session we could do a whole session on. And as we said before, ask for what you need as a new manager. Use your skip [00:48:00] levels, use your hr, use your manager, go to classes, get other people, get a board of directors. Don't wait if things are not going well. Get support quickly. Fail fast. Fail fast because you don't have opportunity to extend. There's somebody and you're like, yeah, they might not be the right person for the team and the last manager didn't do anything about it. And if you know in your gut, get some support on what to do next and get on it. Just don't give them another year to fail. It's not helping you or that, or that team member.

Cyndi: That's a tricky situation, right? I mean, especially, if you're a trauma survivor who's a leader, and, you have significant attachment wounds, these types of situations and scenarios related to people leaving, you needing people to leave, they can trigger those things. So be [00:49:00] aware, that there are certain scenarios as a leader, that will come up, that may trip up or trigger your own wounding as a trauma survivor. Just be aware of that. It's so important to understand who we are as a trauma survivor, and what we need to do to manage our own regulation and to manage our emotional well-being. And then to take those concepts or those systems that we have in place for self care and regulation, and co-regulation and relationship building and all the things that we need to do to manage our own mental health. And then to wrap it around the environment or the situation or scenario of being a leader. And leader, to me means you, go first. [00:50:00] You demonstrate what that means to do self care. You demonstrate what that means to take a time out. You demonstrate what it means to regulate in an intense situation. You demonstrate what it means to come alongside someone who's struggling. You demonstrate that. You lead first and you lead by doing. 

Holly: Yeah, and a couple things that came up just so people know when they may need to pay a close attention to things that may trigger you, or especially around attachment wounds, this has come up. Interviewing. Because you may like somebody, and you're like, " that's my person," and they are not qualified for the job. So, I would say always have a couple people interview. That's one example, interviewing

When it is time to put someone on a performance plan could be really hard, especially If you like the person. I was given [00:51:00] feedback, and this is what was just flashed back for me, is now that I think about it, it probably was related. About halfway through my career, I gave people just too many chances. It took me a long time to pull the trigger, because, I was like, I can help them. I could not fix them, but I can help them get better, I can give them the chance, I can give them ideas, and I gave too many chances most of the time. And a manager finally said, you know, I think it's time. And they had to kind of like, luckily that manager told me, you're just doing it too much. So those, you know, hiring, putting people on performance are areas I would say play closer attention. Is it your trauma getting involved in some of these decisions or some of the execution.

Cyndi: Because that's fawning, right? I mean, when we think about that and we're trying to give people the ultimate chance. I mean, we would've wanted someone to give us that chance, but also we want people to like us, because that's [00:52:00] safe, when people like us. And that is a trauma response. That is us operating out of a trauma-informed, thinking brain.

Holly: Well, it's human, right? We want to belong. Belonging is a human thing, but then we take it to the extreme 

Cyndi: oh, that's funny. So, is there anything else? Now, we've talked about a lot and it really starts with who you are as a manager and how you manage your trauma and how you manage your triggers and how you show up, in recovery in the healing journey. And then, how do you apply that to your role as a leader?

Because if you're a new leader, especially, you're going to have these new situations that you're now going to have to deal with, like performance reviews and those types of things. Hiring people. Just know that those new situations and scenarios may trip up some of the things that you have in place and you're going to have to work through those things. And that is normal part of the journey. I want people to hear that [00:53:00] that is a normal part of the growth process.

That when you're in that space Dr. Kennedy talks about the learning space and talks about the distance between not knowing something and knowing something, and that discomfort between those two points is the learning space. I love that she says that. It's something that has stuck with me and it's like, wow, that makes so much sense. And so, as a new leader, you're also learning, so learning how to not only apply the different tools that you own as a trauma survivor in your own healing journey, but also to apply that to different roles and different environments, in different jobs, in different leadership levels. So learning that and giving yourself a lot of grace to learn.

Holly: Thank you for saying that. That's what I was going to say is giving yourself grace and having self-compassion. [00:54:00] If you do not know what self-compassion is really and have some it would be hard fetched to take a job in leadership without some self-compassion because you're going to mess up. We're human. 

So have grace and self-compassion for yourself. And also be realistic on what that learning time is. If you go to a big tech company, it is about 18 months. That is an 18 month learning curve. And people think, oh, in two months I'm going to... no, it's an 18 month learning curve. And if you're new to the company on top of being a manager, you can tack on time to that. So, being really realistic, because as trauma survivors, sometimes we just think, oh, everything needs to move fast, and if it's not, I'm not good enough. Be realistic about time. That's my final words on that.

Cyndi: Is there anything else that you want to bring up or talk about that we maybe didn't get to today or you think would be helpful for our listeners?[00:55:00] 

Holly: Not now. I think we've got a couple more things we can add on to the end, again, more topics to talk about later. 

Cyndi: This is good. I had a topic that I was thinking about, but it'll be a surprise for our leaders next time. We had certain things that we had on our agenda to talk about, but I feel like we're charting a new path, so maybe we want to take up another topic, We'll let them know later. I think that's going to be fun.

Holly: Sounds good. 

Cyndi: Thank you so much for being here and joining. It's been a pleasure as always talking to you and you're just brilliant as usual. So, I look forward to our continued conversations together. 

You're not walking this path alone. Every step you take toward a trauma wise career is an act of courage, and I'm here cheering you on. If today's episode resonated with you, share it with another survivor who needs to hear this [00:56:00] message. Together we're rewriting the rules of career success. Keep rising, keep healing, keep building.