I have worked with a lot of people over my years as an Executive Coach and seen them make amazing transformations. How are most of them doing it? Baby steps!

I know there can be the appeal of waiting for that one life-changing moment to turn things around and propel you to where you want to be. But, the reality is that it often doesn’t happen like that.

Sustainable change happens when we take small steps every single day, which alters our habits and rewires our brains so that over time, a real shift can take place.

Earlier on in my adult life, I seemed to thrive on adventure. I was always going here and there, pushing myself physically and loving the challenges. But, after having kids and more senior roles at work, adventure became about doing the best I could each day to keep all the balls up in the air! And, if I am being honest here, my carefree attitude in life became more about being a responsible adult.

Priorities change throughout the different stages of our lives. But, when I was recently talking to one of my clients about his adventures in Patagonia, Argentina, it lit a spark within me.

When you think about adventure, what comes to mind for you? How can you fit more of that into your life now?

I suffered a severe concussion 12 years ago when I fainted during a stand-up X-ray, smashing my head off the concrete floor of a medical facility.

My symptoms of headaches (made increasingly worse with any sort of noise, movement around me, or thinking), blurry vision that was extremely sensitive to light with a bunch of floaters (black squiggly lines) in my line of vision, physical fatigue, dizziness, short term memory issues (I could remember things from years ago but couldn’t remember the conversation I’d just have with my husband), and a really challenging time multitasking

My continued healing journey has been a long one. But, I have moved mountains in terms of where I am now compared to where I was. My experience has taught me:

Do you feel you are on the right path now? The path I am on is definitely not the path I thought I would be on at this stage in my life. I envisioned things looking very differently. I never thought my spouse would die so young and that I would be raising our children by myself and with a brain injury myself. And let’s not forget about COVID. That has made everyone’s paths veer off a bit from where they likely thought they were going to be.

But regardless if this is the path you saw for yourself or not, this is indeed the path you are on. How do you make the most of it?

This picture was taken recently on the 4th anniversary of my husband’s death. The rough waves and dark sky parallels the emotions I was feeling the day my beautiful 46 year old husband died in my arms after a 23-month battle with esophageal cancer.

To see this man I loved with my whole heart slip away breath after breath was excruciating. Knowing how badly he wanted to stay. And then to have to call our 8 and 10-year-old daughters to come in to see us, them unaware that this would be the moment they would learn their Daddy had died.

I have also faced intense physical pain. So how can we befriend pain and use it as a tool to help us be our best in work and in life?

I think this is a question we all ask ourselves at least once in our lives. For me, I seem to ask this question every few years. Just when I think I have the answer, something in my life shifts, and my life experiences evolve me into a different version of myself.

It can be fun experiences that allow us to grow, but I find change often comes when we have to dig deep within ourselves to get through a period of sadness, change, disappointment, or fear. Not dissimilar to the caterpillar in the cocoon, when we face struggle and challenge, we grow into something else.

Many of the leaders I coach have to sell as part of their roles, even if they are not in a direct sales position. Being able to sell your product, business or even your own ideas is a crucial part of creating success. But, it is not easy for a lot of people to do.

Why? Well, it can feel vulnerable. What if that person doesn’t buy what I am selling? What does that say about me? Or, “I don’t want to bug people.”I get it. But, changing your perspective to one of helping and serving others can help change everything for you.

Very few people I know have received any formalized mentorship training/coaching. Yet, most people have a strong component of mentoring others as part of their job.

Mentoring others isn’t just a nice to do, it is a need to do. If you want to be competitive in the marketplace, you need to have strong people. One of the best ways to create strong people is for them to have mentors. Either everyone struggles themselves along their career journey, or they have people to help teach them.

Tips to continue to grow to be a strong mentor?

“It comes in waves,” is often how I’ve heard grief described. For me, there have been many days when it has felt like a tsunami after losing both my Husband and Dad to cancer. I have envisioned myself as a surfer, clinging to my board in these conditions, just trying to survive.

So when I connected with Dan Fischer, an avid surfer, who has taken that notion quite literally with his One Last Wave Project that connects grief, honouring our passed loved ones, and surfing, my interest was peaked.

No doubt you have worked hard to climb your way up the corporate ladder. Probably at times throughout your career, you wished there would be two of you to accomplish what you needed to do.

And then, you made it to the leadership ranks, and voila…an Executive Assistant appears! This is a dream come true. An extension of yourself. Someone to help you free up more time to be strategic and coach your people. But in the work I do as an Executive Coach, I can tell you that this Executive Assistant Fairy Tale sometimes ends up being just that, and the time of the leader and the EA is not utilized as well as it could be. As such, I’d like to share some tips for working with your executive Assistant for the best results!

In September 2012, shortly after I suffered a brain injury, I was featured as part of a news story in The Globe and Mail’s Report on Business section entitled ‘Is Being Superbusy so Bad?’ by Leah Eichler.

At the time, I was a few months out from my brain injury. I knew I was not back to normal yet, but I had no idea that my healing journey would still be going on almost 11 years later…

This month was supposed to be my husband Jeff’s 50th birthday. It is also around the time that would mark 5 years since his cancer treatment for stage 3 esophageal cancer wrapped up. For anyone who knows about cancer, you know that five years without cancer rearing its ugly head again after treatment is a major milestone. It means you are officially in remission and cancer-free. So this month was going to be something really big to celebrate at our house!

But the cancer came back and on August 7, 2019, Jeff died in my arms. For those still getting to know me, I want you to know that so much of who I am today is because of Jeff Oestreicher.

We all have so many things to do and so much responsibility. I reached a point earlier on in my life when I knew that something needed to shift for me. Doing it all was no longer an option. This led me to create a two-question filter system I use now whenever I am presented with a new work project or a social event. I have found this filter system works so well that I now share it with my clients and they are finding it beneficial too. The good part? It is so easy. It feels like common sense, yet pausing to ask yourself these two questions can completely change the way you work.

If you are running around the clock, it is time to look at your calendar. It doesn’t matter if you are a CEO or a student. If you are feeling flung through the day, you are not setting yourself up for success. It is no longer a badge of honour for leaders to talk about how busy they are. Busyness doesn’t equate to strong leadership. If you have got so many things to squeeze into your day and you are not sure how to do it, here are some tips for you!

am noticing a trend in the Executive Coaching work I do where leaders who are normally intensely focused on the next thing and always striving for more, have hit a lull.

There is nothing wrong with them. Their performance isn’t suffering, yet they aren’t feeling particularly inspired to go guns ablazing onto the next project or career move. And, this lack of goal-setting and intense desire to strive is feeling very weird for them. It is hard to put a finger on what’s ‘wrong,’ except they report just feeling “okay.” What has caused this feeling amongst many leaders?

This week, I gave a keynote speech for a corporation. I had a busy morning juggling a few things so got to the point where I realized I didn't have time to BOTH review my notes for this speech AND take a few minutes for me to ground myself, close my eyes and breathe deeply and visualize my connection with the audience. I had to choose one area to put my focus on for my prep for this speech.

I have learned some great lessons throughout my career about presentations. I was the former speechwriter for the CEO of General Motors, then became a VP of Communications and Business Development responsible for making regular presentations to clients and Boards. I have been a spokesperson for a variety of global and national brands. And, I have been interviewed for more than 5000 media interviews since the time I was 23 years old. Now I am a keynote speaker.

What Tips Can I Share With You to Make Your Talks More Impactful?

As an Executive Coach for almost 15 years now, I have seen a lot of trends in people development. But, I’ve never seen anything quite like the impact that already busy professionals have faced when they entered into a global pandemic. Leaders needed to push into a new layer of resilience around working at a high level from home while having other responsibilities laid upon them like homeschooling their children. It really has been a unique time.

So, how do you start to feel more like yourself again?

I was recently connecting with a dear friend of mine who has been through a lot in her life. She had a dream of what her life would look like and in some ways, it just hasn’t turned out that way. As I listened to her, I felt a part of me think I am feeling the same way! Yes, our stories are different but we both had this path in life that we thought we were on and then it seems we veered off of it somehow.

After our conversation, I kept thinking about this idea of the path I wanted to take so badly and how it seems that the more I try to get back on it, the more I get pushed off into the ditch. Then an epiphany hit me.

This is the conundrum faced by many a Type A workaholic perfectionist who works so hard and likely drives a hardworking, successful team. How do I really make space to celebrate? I mean really celebrate your successes, not just the token holiday party or dinner out for the team to mark the completion of a big projection while you are consumed already by the next thing. This celebration shift is just as much about a state of mind as it is about what you actually do for yourself and/or your team to celebrate.