Personal development

Some of my most popular episodes have been on overthinking and worry and I know from personal experience how much it can hold you back and impact your self-esteem.   So I jumped at the chance to interview Nicole Freeman, who coaches many senior professionals around overthinking.

In this episode you’ll hear more about…

How overthinking is linked to avoiding our feelings

The 3 key fears that come up for many of us

The signs that you may be overthinking

Practical steps you can take to deal with overthinking and build more positive thought patterns

My name’s Carla Miller, leadership coach, author and trainer. And this is the Influence & Impact podcast for women leaders, helping you confidently navigate the ups and downs of leadership and feel less alone on your journey as a leader.  In fortnightly episodes I share practical tools and insights from myself and my brilliant guests that will help you succeed in your career.

You might also enjoy episode 110 ‘How to stop overthinking’ and episodes 122 and 123 on worrying.

FREE RESOURCE - How To Say No Challenge:

If you struggle to say ‘no’ then this free 5 day challenge is for you.  You’ll receive a short email each day containing a short video taking you through the 5 steps of my How To Say No framework. We’ll get you happily saying no in just 5 days!

Influence & Impact:

Join the next cohort of Influence & Impact to learn how to tackle self-doubt, increase your impact and become brilliant at influencing.  It’s a small cohort working closely with me and includes 6 workshops and 2 peer coaching sessions.

Be Bolder

My Be Bolder 4 week confidence and assertiveness course will be running again in February.  In it we cover:

⭐ Tackling imposter feelings and self-doubt

⭐ Mastering your mindset

⭐ Courageous conversations

⭐ Speaking up

More about Nicole Freeman:

Nicole is a highly regarded ICF accredited coach working with mid- and senior-level professionals. With chartered accountancy and MBA qualifications as well as experience as an interim FD, business consultant, owner of her own multi award winning business and having run a small family business, she’s commercially focused with strong business acumen, and comfortable across a range of industries. Her background as a top performing audit and transaction senior manager, and then project manager to the UK leadership team in one of the Big 4 accountancy firms, means she’s well placed to understand the challenges those in professional services face.

Her areas of expertise are around perfectionism, people pleasing and

procrastination, things common for high achievers. As a trusted confidante, sounding board and thinking partner, Nicole is a natural asset to individuals and organisations keen to unlock their full potential through coaching.

Nicole’s website: www.nicolefreeman.co.uk

Find Nicole on LinkedIn

Nicole offers a free Mindset MOT you can book at

This episode was prompted by a request from one of the members of my Women Leading community who asked how she could build more personal resilience around the impact of decisions she was making at work and be a little more “Teflon coated”.

Perhaps you relate – you need to make tough decisions as a leader but you take things to heart, you care about people and their wellbeing and sometimes the decisions you make can have significant impact on others.

Or perhaps you are the person who is implementing the decisions that others have made and cascading unwelcome news or making unpopular changes.  You may be involved in a restructure for example or taking a team member through performance management.

Now, I didn’t want to call this ‘how to care less as a leader’ because I don’t think that those of us who care a lot would embrace the idea of caring less.  Caring, having empathy, being conscious of the impact of our decisions on people - these are all wonderful traits for a leader to have and may well be a huge strength of yours as a leader.

However, if caring has no boundaries around it then you could be heading towards sleepless nights, self-doubt and possibly even burnout.

In this episode I’m going to explore 3 insights and 3 tools and techniques to help you if you are someone who cares too much as a leader.

My name’s Carla Miller, leadership coach, author and trainer. And this is the Influence & Impact podcast for women leaders, helping you confidently navigate the ups and downs of leadership and feel less alone on your journey as a leader.  In fortnightly episodes I share practical tools and insights from myself and my brilliant guests that will help you succeed in your career.

FREE RESOURCE - How To Say No Challenge:

If you struggle to say ‘no’ then this free 5 day challenge is for you.  You’ll receive a short email each day containing a short video taking you through the 5 steps of my How To Say No framework. We’ll get you happily saying no in just 5 days!

Influence & Impact:

Join the May cohort of Influence & Impact to learn how to tackle self-doubt, increase your impact and become brilliant at influencing.  It’s a small cohort working closely with me and includes 6 workshops and 2 peer coaching sessions.

Be Bolder

My Be Bolder 4 week confidence and assertiveness course will be running again in February.  In it we cover:

⭐ Tackling imposter feelings and self-doubt

⭐ Mastering your mindset

⭐ Courageous conversations

⭐ Speaking up

Get in touch with me via LinkedIn or my website to chat about how I could work with you or your organisation.

I’ve got another episode where I am a guest for you, this time I’m talking about how to get your voice heard at work with Aoife O’Brien on her Happier at Work podcast.

One of the key issues we discussed was the challenge of being interrupted in meetings, particularly for women. I provide strategies for managing interruptions and finding opportunities to speak up, including utilising allies and the powerful strategy of amplification.

In this episode you’ll hear more about…

The impact of gender bias on confidence.

Strategies for managing interruptions and finding opportunities to speak up.

The importance of integrating body language tools and my "Cloak of Authority" to feel more in control in challenging situations.

The significance of delivering feedback upwards in a diplomatic and solution-focused manner.

The importance of body language and ending contributions with confidence.

My name’s Carla Miller, leadership coach, author and trainer. And this is the Influence & Impact podcast for women leaders, helping you confidently navigate the ups and downs of leadership and feel less alone on your journey as a leader.  In fortnightly episodes I share practical tools and insights from myself and my brilliant guests that will help you succeed in your career.

FREE RESOURCE - How To Say No Challenge:

If you struggle to say ‘no’ then this free 5 day challenge is for you.  You’ll receive a short email each day containing a short video taking you through the 5 steps of my How To Say No framework. We’ll get you happily saying no in just 5 days!

Influence & Impact:

Join the next cohort of Influence & Impact to learn how to tackle self-doubt, increase your impact and become brilliant at influencing.  It’s a small cohort working closely with me and includes 6 workshops and 2 peer coaching sessions.

Be Bolder

My Be Bolder 4 week confidence and assertiveness course will be running again in February.  In it we cover:

⭐ Tackling imposter feelings and self-doubt

⭐ Mastering your mindset

⭐ Courageous conversations

⭐ Speaking up

Women Leading:

My Women Leading community gives you the support and strategies you need to:

⭐ Set boundaries and expectations

⭐ Prioritise your wellbeing

⭐ Coach your hybrid team effectively

⭐ Stop people pleasing

⭐ Lead under pressure

All for just £49/month

And if you’re not already an avid listener to Aoife’s Happier At Work podcast go follow it now.  She has some fantastic guests talking about all aspects of work.

This week’s episode is a little different in that I am the guest and you get to hear me being interviewed for once!  In this episode I recorded for Lucy Gernon’s 360 LeadHERship podcast you’ll hear…

The story of my career and how and why I became a coach

My top tips on making the right first impression on a new line manager or senior stakeholder

How to hold your own and build your influence with the key stakeholders in your organisation

Some of my top tips for being confident around senior people

My name’s Carla Miller, leadership coach, author and trainer. And this is the Influence & Impact podcast for women leaders, helping you confidently navigate the ups and downs of leadership and feel less alone on your journey as a leader.  In fortnightly episodes I share practical tools and insights from myself and my brilliant guests that will help you succeed in your career.

FREE RESOURCE - How To Say No Challenge:

If you struggle to say ‘no’ then this free 5 day challenge is for you.  You’ll receive a short email each day containing a short video taking you through the 5 steps of my How To Say No framework. We’ll get you happily saying no in just 5 days!

Influence & Impact:

Join the next cohort of Influence & Impact to learn how to tackle self-doubt, increase your impact and become brilliant at influencing.  It’s a small cohort working closely with me and includes 6 workshops and 2 peer coaching sessions.

Be Bolder

My Be Bolder 4 week confidence and assertiveness course will be running again in February.  In it we cover:

⭐ Tackling imposter feelings and self-doubt

⭐ Mastering your mindset

⭐ Courageous conversations

⭐ Speaking up

Women Leading:

My Women Leading community gives you the support and strategies you need to:

⭐ Set boundaries and expectations

⭐ Prioritise your wellbeing

⭐ Coach your hybrid team effectively

⭐ Stop people pleasing

⭐ Lead under pressure

All for just £49/month

And if you’re not already an avid listener to Lucy’s 360 LeadHERship podcast go and add it to your follow list now.

Whilst some women sail through perimenopause, lots of us struggle with symptoms including brain fog, sleep issues, hot flushes and anxiety.  Those symptoms can impede our ability to work, impact our confidence and cause an alarming number of women to leave their jobs.

I explore this with my guest Emma Thomas, founder of Managing the Menopause and host of the Middling Along podcast.

We discuss:

Why employers should care about supporting women through this transition

What managers can do to be supportive of colleagues struggling with perimenopause symptoms

How to talk to your line manager about your symptoms and what support you can request

Emma’s SENSE model for managing symptoms through lifestyle changes

Insights on how caffeine and alcohol impact your sleep

Emma is also teaching her SENSE model inside my Women Leading community at our bi-monthly menopause gatherings where we meet to share experiences and coping strategies.

My name’s Carla Miller, leadership coach, author and trainer. And this is the Influence & Impact podcast for women leaders, helping you confidently navigate the ups and downs of leadership and feel less alone on your journey as a leader.  In fortnightly episodes I share practical tools and insights from myself and my brilliant guests that will help you succeed in your career.

FREE RESOURCE - How To Say No Challenge:

If you struggle to say ‘no’ then this free 5 day challenge is for you.  You’ll receive a short email each day containing a short video taking you through the 5 steps of my How To Say No framework. We’ll get you happily saying no in just 5 days!

Influence & Impact:

Join the next cohort of Influence & Impact to learn how to tackle self-doubt, increase your impact and become brilliant at influencing.  It’s a small cohort working closely with me and includes 6 workshops and 2 peer coaching sessions.

Be Bolder

My Be Bolder 4 week confidence and assertiveness course will be running again in February.  In it we cover:

⭐ Tackling imposter feelings and self-doubt

⭐ Mastering your mindset

⭐ Courageous conversations

⭐ Speaking up

Women Leading:

My Women Leading community gives you the support and strategies you need to:

⭐ Set boundaries and expectations

⭐ Prioritise your wellbeing

⭐ Coach your hybrid team effectively

⭐ Stop people pleasing

⭐ Lead under pressure

All for just £49/month

About Emma Thomas:

Emma is the founder of Managing the Menopause - her experience in coaching, internal communications and change management make her perfectly placed to help organizations plan and execute strategies to become more ‘menopause-friendly.’ Emma lives in Oxford with her husband and two children, and is also a Director of the Udjat CIC, which operates a wide-range of projects within Oxford and beyond.

Emma’s website

Emma’s podcast

When I was sent a book called The Emotional Overdraft I instinctively knew that this was a topic that was going to resonate with me personally and you as listeners to this podcast.

An emotional overdraft is when you as a leader habitually overcome your employer’s challenges at the cost of our own physical and mental health. Sound familiar?

I am seeing this happening a LOT at the moment with the women within my Women Leading community so I was excited to dive into the topic with the book’s author Andy Brown.

We discussed:

My name’s Carla Miller, leadership coach, author and trainer. And this is the Influence & Impact podcast for women leaders, helping you confidently navigate the ups and downs of leadership and feel less alone on your journey as a leader.  In fortnightly episodes I share practical tools and insights from myself and my brilliant guests that will help you succeed in your career.

FREE RESOURCE - How To Say No Challenge:

If you struggle to say ‘no’ then this free 5 day challenge is for you.  You’ll receive a short email each day containing a short video taking you through the 5 steps of my How To Say No framework. We’ll get you happily saying no in just 5 days!

Influence & Impact:

Join the next cohort of Influence & Impact to learn how to tackle self-doubt, increase your impact and become brilliant at influencing.  It’s a small cohort working closely with me and includes 6 workshops and 2 peer coaching sessions.

Be Bolder

My Be Bolder 4 week confidence and assertiveness course will be running again in February.  In it we cover:

⭐ Tackling imposter feelings and self-doubt

⭐ Mastering your mindset

⭐ Courageous conversations

⭐ Speaking up

Women Leading:

My Women Leading community gives you the support and strategies you need to:

⭐ Set boundaries and expectations

⭐ Prioritise your wellbeing

⭐ Coach your hybrid team effectively

⭐ Stop people pleasing

⭐ Lead under pressure

All for just £49/month 

About Andy Brown:

Andy has over 30 years’ experience as an award-winning adviser and coach for people-based businesses. He’s also a podcast host and the author of Amazon #1 best seller, ‘The Emotional Overdraft: 10 simple changes for balancing business success and wellbeing’ a book for entrepreneurs, leaders and founders that articulates the often overlooked mental and physical costs of leadership

Links from Andy:

Buy the book in the UK

Complete the free Emotional Overdraft Self-Assessment

Connect with Andy

Follow Emotional Overdraft on Instagram

Get all the latest Emotional Overdraft articles