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Show Notes

Today on the show, Sujani speaks about leadership once again.

We introduced the topic of leadership in public health on the PHSPOTlight podcast in episode 12 with Nadia Akseer. In that kick-off episode, we committed to bringing conversations with more of our peers around the topic of leadership. We want leadership in public health to be a skill that you are constantly thinking about building on, as much as (if not more) than building technical or software skills. The conversations we are choosing to share with you are with leaders who are not only our peers but those who we feel we can learn a lot from and be inspired by to take real action.

In this episode, Sujani sits down with Anjum Sultana. Anjum is someone Sujani has known for a number of years and has interacted with via phone calls and messaging/email, but this was the first time they both "saw" each other (virtually), so it was a special conversation. Anjum’s advocacy and leadership work is also something that Sujani has been inspired by over the years.

The conversation with Anjum is not only jam-packed with inspiration and motivation to be a leader in public health but also weaves tangible first steps for all of us to take.

Public health needs many strong leaders to push agendas forward, and we hope that by sharing stories like that of Anjum's, you walk away feeling like you too can be a leader in public health.

You’ll Learn

• How Anjum defines leadership
• Whether she intentionally chose to become a leader in her space, or it naturally occurred
• A bit about the young Anjum, her first memory of thinking that she could be a leader, and how her dad was an inspiration to her, which has resulted in the work she does in her community
• Attributes of a good leader (skills to build on for anyone wanting to be a leader in their space), and skills Anjum wished she had gained early on
• Things students can focus on specifically while in school to set themselves up to become a strong leader
• Step-by-step how we can go from feeling passionate about a topic/issue/cause to taking incremental action that leads to change. 
• Whether leadership only comes from a management/senior-level role (hint: no it doesn’t)
• Whether leaders are born OR if leadership can be learned
• Challenges Anjum faces as a leader in her space
• A final example where Anjum showed that she is a leader in her space: she talks about her journey first authoring Canada’s First Feminist Recovery Plan.
  • It is the first nationally-focused one in the country and possibly the world
  • She encourages the PH SPOT community to read it, make it your own, and reach out to her should you be interested in taking action

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