The Pause Before You Lead
Leadership today asks a lot of people.
Leaders make decisions with incomplete information, navigate competing priorities, support others through change, and respond to challenges that rarely have simple answers.
In the midst of all that, it's easy to keep moving without creating space to think.
Hosted by Heather Haigh and Alicia Saint, The Pause Before You Lead is a podcast for leaders navigating growth, complexity, and uncertainty. Each week, Heather and Alicia explore the conversations, assumptions, patterns, and tensions that influence how leaders think, decide, communicate, and lead.
Drawing on decades of leadership experience and more than ten years coaching, consulting, and partnering with leaders and teams, they bring thoughtful dialogue, practical wisdom, and powerful questions to the real challenges leaders face every day.
Whether you're leading a team, an organization, or your own next chapter, these conversations will invite you to pause, reflect, and see something you may not have noticed before.
New episodes released weekly.
The Pause Before You Lead
What If I'm Wrong?
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What if the question you most resist is the one worth sitting with?
In this episode of The Pause Before You Lead, Heather shares why “What if I’m wrong?” once sparked such a strong reaction in her, while Alicia explores the diverse ways this question can land.
Together, they consider what our reactions to being wrong might reveal about how we lead, and what our certainty may be creating for the people around us.
Of course I've got the best answer. Of course you just need to listen to me. Of course, right? Now we've you can really hear that. Now it's become very me focused. And imagine the impact on the others in the room. Um wow. Like, okay, let's just, you know what? I'm just gonna back off here and you know what? We're just gonna go with your decision, Heather?
unknownSounds great.
SPEAKER_02Sounds great. Sounds great. I might think there's a different way, a better way, another possibility, but you know what? I'm just you are so confident and so strong in your conviction I've either now started to doubt my ideas, or I'm not willing to go up against that. I'm not willing to engage through. Hi, and welcome to the Pause Before You Lead. I'm Alicia Saint, and I'm Heather Haig. And together, we've both led teams inside large organizations. And over the past decade, we've coached and partnered with hundreds of leaders and teams navigating complexity. We've seen, felt, heard, and supported leaders through the challenging and sometimes really messy parts of leadership. And while a lot has changed, many of the patterns that quietly take leaders off track just keep showing up.
SPEAKER_00We work with leaders who don't want to lose momentum, but who know that clearer thinking is what makes momentum sustainable. This podcast is for leaders who are moving fast, leading teams, and making decisions under constant pressure. And leaders who know there's a better way to think, lead, and respond in those moments.
SPEAKER_02Each week, we bring you real conversations drawn from our work with leaders and teams, where speed matters, stakes are high, and the quality of your thinking shapes everything. So in each episode, we're going to pause just long enough to think more clearly, to see what's really going on, make better decisions, and build high-value teams.
SPEAKER_00Whether you're listening before the day takes over, on your way to work, or in the middle of a full day, this is your pause without losing momentum. So before we begin, take a breath and join us. Hi. Welcome to the pause before you lead. I'm Heather Haig. And I'm Alicia Saints.
SPEAKER_02And this week, our uh topic is what if I'm wrong? So uh Heather, I'm excited because I'm up at the cottage this week and you know it's my happy place. So I'm feeling really buzzy for this for this conversation. And I know this is uh this is um one close to your heart. So um I uh I'm gonna invite you to to share some of the um thoughts you have around that question. What if I'm wrong?
SPEAKER_00Yeah. And I love when I hear the question, what if I'm wrong? I still have a reaction. So let let me take you back to where I first experienced this question. Uh a number of years ago, I was participating in a coaching program with Doug Silsby, who um who we've unfortunately lost. Uh he's since passed. Towards the end of the program, he invites this question for all of us to consider. And he said, What if I'm wrong? And I had a visceral reaction to this question. I could actually feel my whole body rejected. Like I didn't, I didn't just not like the question. I hated this question with a passion. It hit me so hard. And I, you know, at the time I just was like, that's that's such a stupid question. I would never ask myself that question. Like I had just really a weird and unexpected response to it. But it was, I had to sit with the, okay, so I hate this question. It's a horrible question. I never asked myself this question. What is happening here? It made me angry to be asked it. And so, yeah, as I sat with it a little longer and kept sort of coming back, it didn't leave me, by the way. It kept coming back, which also is great information that we need to do some work. It wasn't just a one and done. The question kept sort of surfacing. And what I noticed for myself in the resistance to it was it was hitting an internal belief that I can't be wrong. And so this possibility of being wrong just seemed why would I ever ask myself that? Obviously, if I know the answer, I know the answer. Like it was, it was so curious. So I know we're gonna dig into this more, but Alicia, as I share my story with you, what are you experiencing?
SPEAKER_02I can still sense and feel the energy that this question has for you. And I I'm thinking about how it actually shows up in so much of the coaching I do with leaders. And it may not be as blatant as asking that question, but it's the belief underneath it, right? Like, I what if I'm wrong? And the panic and the fear and the defensiveness um about that, right? And and just everything that that leads to, right? Which we're gonna jump into. So um I get it. Yeah, I I I get it personally, I can feel it. I think mine was um, I used to think I was wrong all the time. So I wasn't as defensive against the question, but I took it in too easily, I think would be what I would say. I it created so much doubt for me. It was like, I I would go to that question too easily. So it's interesting, maybe there's even a it like a polarities here around that question. Like, what does this question bring up for you? You know, for you, it's defensiveness of how can I be, I can't be. And for me, it was this constant doubt, which was, what if I am wrong? I I think I'm wrong. I'm probably wrong, right? So a willingness to bring it in and pushing it away. So, so I think it is a very, you're right, it's a really powerful question to even pause, haha. Pause and notice how is this question landing for you?
SPEAKER_00And maybe that's the first question, isn't it? Just to sort of hear the question and just notice in ourselves how we react. I love that you brought the polarities in here, Alicia, because I think there is the I'm always wrong, or I'm people regularly tell me I'm wrong and like I start to believe it. I mean, I know we both work with some leaders where the focus is on building trust and confidence in self, like actually seeing you know more than you believe you do. You have more right to be sharing your thinking. Um, so that that sort of support in that way. And then on the polar opposite, if we will, and I don't know that it's necessarily a confidence thing per se. I don't people often talk to me about how I convey confidence. I don't know that I necessarily always feel like 100% confident in things that I do, but I do feel very certain when I think I know something. And so there's there's something that hits my ego when I feel challenged on something I'm certain I know. And that instead of the um maybe getting quieter and and doubting, I actually do the charging forward and the, oh, really, let me show you how much I know I'm not wrong. Let me double down on this one. Yeah. And even if it wasn't something that I was like a hundred percent certain on, it was almost like that was like the the taunt that invited a firmer stance, a more certain, a leaning in to challenge. So sometimes it might be defensiveness, but I need to charge in to go into battle, which is a really interesting thing. Right? Like a fight, yeah, the fight reaction of the impact personality is very alive and well in that, in that instance. And so um the first thing was noticing the reaction and then sort of under understanding the reaction a little bit more. And then having to get kind of brutally honest and say, how willing am I to consider other perspectives if I'm operating from a place of I can't possibly be wrong?
SPEAKER_01You know?
SPEAKER_00So if someone, if someone else, and maybe that was sort of how like instead of me starting to see that question of like, I'm asking myself if there's a possibility of another way of seeing things, I'm hearing the question as a judgment, you're wrong. Like you actually strip it right down. What I'm hearing is an accusation. No, you're wrong.
SPEAKER_02And then thinking about, okay, so noticing that that you're interpreting, there's an assumption you've just attached to that. What um what do you notice as your behavior as a result of that? Like as you think about going back to corporate. Because I know you had a moment where you were able to just sit and reflect with that. Do you see, do you see situations when you look back to corporate where you were possibly operating from that place of defensiveness and judgment?
SPEAKER_00There's too, there's too many examples to list, Lisa. And I and it's hard, you know, it's hard sometimes to own that. Many times in my corporate career, I got feedback that I could be strong, forceful. You know, like there were there were different defining words. I don't know that I was ever told I was pushy. The word that people would say you would use is you intimidate people. Oh. Wow. Yeah. Yeah. So uh, but even in that, like I couldn't hear the how might I be wrong. I would be, I would be like, well, that's because I'm confident. And like, you know, like even I would get defensive even around the intimidating versus receiving it and going, huh, what an interesting perspective. What can I learn from that? Yeah.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. Right.
SPEAKER_00I would get mad about it and say, well, that's their problem. Their problem. Yeah. You know, versus I have to do something about that.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, absolutely. And I think about again, as we're exploring the polarities of it, right? As a connection, right? And coming from people first, heart-centered first, the always questioning myself, what if I'm wrong? Then it actually diminished. And my feedback used to be: you need to be firmer, you need to be um more outspoken, you need to be more like have more conviction, right? So it's interesting, again, knowing yourself is so helpful.
SPEAKER_00And I want to bring us back to the specific question of what if I'm wrong for a moment. Because what I what I've found over the years, and it didn't happen on day one, as I said, like I had to sit with this thing and play with it and, you know, reject it and try again. But it's become my favorite question now for myself because I don't, I don't feel the same judgment in it that I use. Like I took away the judgment aspect of the question and looked at the question from from the lens of it doesn't mean I am wrong, right? Like the question doesn't say I'm wrong. The question says what else might be possible, right? Like, what if the way that you're so certain you're seeing it isn't actually the best way to see it? It's one way, but maybe it's not the best way. And and so the reframing of the association or meaning behind the question started to shift where it it became a question of possibility instead of a question of judgment.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. And if you take yourself back to some of those instances, right, where you were getting the feedback about you're too strong, you're you're you know, too confident, if you were operating from that assumption and that belief, how how might you, how do you think you might have come across differently?
SPEAKER_01Like if I got to have a do-over, you know what I'm saying? Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Press the tape recorder, do a do over. I think I think that if I had the opportunity to reframe the way I received feedback as information versus fact, as something that could help me learn something versus everything that everyone else says is true. Right. But it instead just got, huh. What can I learn from being told that I'm intimidating other people? What can I learn from being told that I maybe I'm overconfident in a way that that isn't landing for certain people? Um I think that I don't know that I'd necessarily always choose to act differently or do things differently, per se, but I think I would have been more discerning about it. You know, I think I would have said, how is this information potentially giving me uh awareness that maybe I don't always need to show up the way that I'm showing up?
SPEAKER_01Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. Right? Yeah. And the discernment, right? That that's such a great question or great phrase to say in the moment, using discernment to say, is this is this a context, a situation where being very stern, direct, um, sure is actually the optimal response or the optimal way to lead in this, because sometimes it absolutely is. Sure. It's it's when it becomes your default, right? And and you're not even having a moment where you're A thinking about a choice, or B, in your case, in the one you just like hearing the feedback, right? That's insight. That's feedback that in the moment can give you the opportunity to go, huh? My intent is, right? Efficiency, effectiveness, this is the best idea. Just let's go with this idea. I'm right, just get in line, versus, huh. I'm I'm noticing resistance. I'm noticing this isn't landing. I'm noticing that uh maybe I'm not right. Maybe it's not the only answer.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. Well, and I think that that what you what you just said there, maybe it's not the only answer, doesn't mean you that my answer was a wrong answer. Exactly. Right? Like the how might I be wrong is very different from uh what I was hearing, which is you're wrong. You're wrong. In fact, it could be I've checked the facts, I've I've looked at the feelings, I've taken the pause long enough to look around and see what else might be possible, and I'm still feeling clear. Yeah. The the opportunity to say just because I'm experienced in something doesn't mean I know the right answer here. You know? And uh I think if we go back to like the career question you were asking, I think I believed very strongly that the way that leaders, successful leaders lead are strong, confident, clear, direct. Knowing, having the answer. Certain. Certain. They don't waver, right? So so the model that was defining how I needed to operate was very inflexible. It was quite fixed. Yes. Um so I was kind of scared to entertain a question that might suggest I didn't have all the answers.
SPEAKER_02Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. And so I'm I'm curious for a moment, uh, you know, doing the do-over theme. So one, it's, you know, starting to just notice, right? What are the situations, the context, the people, the topics that I start to see a pattern that that might that I notice I get maybe a little a little defensive to being wrong or feel a little more challenged or um yeah, so it's it's starting to notice is there a pattern where what if I'm wrong really can show up?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, and I, you know, I think the the greatest thing that I could have done is start to ask that question more regularly.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_00And and certainly by doing that, started to see the patterns of where certainty wasn't helpful. Uh where um where I was connecting dots without evidence. And when my brain likes to move faster than the moment, uh, I can be really certain that I know what's gonna happen next. And so that gets in the way of being in the here and now, both both internally, like for me and for the person that I'm with. Yeah. Yeah.
SPEAKER_02Because what I was noticing when you were saying that was you become very me focused.
unknownYeah.
SPEAKER_00And not on purpose or consciously, right? Like it's like it's not once you start to see it, right?
SPEAKER_02You realize I've actually, I've actually closed, closed down this situation because it's now become about me. I possibly can't be wrong. Of course I've got the best answer. Of course, you just need to listen to me. Of course, right? Now we've you can really hear that. Now it's become very me focused. And imagine the impact on the others in the room. Um, wow. Like, okay, let's just, you know what? I'm just gonna back off here. And you know what? We're just gonna go with your decision, Heather.
unknownSounds great.
SPEAKER_02Sounds great. Sounds great. I might think there's a different way, a better way, another possibility, but you know what? I'm just, you are so confident and so strong in your conviction, I've either now started to doubt my ideas, or I'm not willing to go up against that. I'm not willing to engage. Like how many people, again, with another topic, but how many people these days are even got the energy to engage in like uh a, you know, a healthy conflict about a leader who's so certain. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Well, and even in that, the how might the how might I be wrong in my perception of what I define as a healthy conflict?
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Right. Because when I'm operating from this, there's risk of me, like I'm fearful of being judged. I'm afraid admitting I might be wrong about something. Something. And it's interesting because it also, for me, wasn't everywhere. It wasn't everything. Right. So I also think too, you start to notice, as you said, the patterns and be able to say, I don't always have this really adverse reaction, but there's certain areas where asking myself, how might I be wrong makes me more uncomfortable than other areas. You know, places where I really do genuinely want feedback because I'm trying to grow, and other places where I'm not asking for feedback because I don't need to grow. And so why I still love this question so much is I think it brings so much insight to say, how do we keep learning about ourselves? And as long as something still is bringing up resistance, defensiveness, doubt, um, however we react to it, is like there's there may still be some work there for us as leaders.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. And and I think just too, as you're thinking, as we're thinking about being actually in these different situations and having do-overs, there's um, I'm just thinking about, you know, when you do start to catch yourself in that moment, right? To be, there's a humility that just says, you know what? I I'm noticing I'm getting really, really um entrenched in this idea for a minute. I'm gonna invite, can I invite people to just challenge this idea? Not it's not challenge me, challenge this idea I'm holding so tightly. Like what, where might I be wrong? Imagine using that question to evoke and invite.
SPEAKER_00Hmm. Especially since we know, like when teams are engaged in that idea creation versus uh evaluation of an already fully formed idea, right? How much more that increases. So I just as you said, that is an invitation to others. Like, like in this, in this conversation, let me know how might I, how might my view of this be wrong or how might you challenge my thinking here? Just created this like freedom and uh like creativity can live in that space. So that was that it was really cool seeing that. And I, you know, as we bring this home, I think one of the things as leaders, we need to let go of the feeling of needing to always be certain. Yeah. And always right. That that somehow is a definition or an indication or a demonstration of of good leadership. Leaders just know. And I I don't, I mean, I don't even know that that's the skill to aspire to. It feels more like leaders having an ability to see be able to see more, right? To be open to seeing things differently might be the skill uh that just invites a lot more possibility.
SPEAKER_02Well, and you think especially in in this time that we're in where everything is changing so quickly, there that that ability to hold, I'm gonna make this room feel as big and expansive and inviting and as it possibly can, because in actual fact, we all need as many ideas as we can possibly come up with, right? So um, yeah, so this has been cool, right? Really that question, what if I'm wrong, um, can land in really different ways. And it's I think what we're inviting our listeners this week is just to pause and really just sit with that question. And what's the impact of this this belief that I'm holding, these assumptions that I'm making, this need to defend might might be creating and stifling. And stifling too.
SPEAKER_01So pause about this week.
SPEAKER_00Thanks for inviting me to share this this story. Uh yeah, and looking forward to our conversation next week because we have another interesting story to share. So until next time, and don't forget to pause before you lead. Thanks for joining the pause before you lead. If this conversation sparked something for you, share it. Because more leaders need space to think clearly in the moments that matter.
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SPEAKER_00Before you move on to what's next, pause just for a moment.
SPEAKER_02And notice what might change if you led from here.