The Corporate Cleanse

*BONUS* episode this week

This week, I sat down with Meikel Reece from The Art of Transformation podcast to talk about self-esteem vs. self-love, our own transformation stories, and navigating career and personal growth.

Meikel is a transformation coach, emotional alchemist, inner child/trauma healing guide and the host of The Art of Transformation podcast.

You can find her on instagram @meikelreece
and The Art of Transformation podcast 

Oh ... Is iT HaRd bEiNg aN eXeCuTiVe? I understand reaching the executive level is a privileged place to be and reaching that level was really great. I’ve never learned so much in my life. I’ve never learned so much about business, about myself as a human, about communication, about human dynamics, about group dynamics, about leadership, about empathy and inclusion. I am really grateful for the opportunity I got to enter the ranks that I always felt out of reach.

The driving forces to want to be promoted to the executive level were: money and to be in the room where it happens. I wanted to matter, I wanted my voice to be heard, I wanted to be in the “know”, I wanted to make decisions and make an impact

But there was A LOT I didn’t know. There was a lot I was surprised by, a lot I wish someone had told me so I could be prepared, a lot that I don’t think many people talk about, because again, it’s this exclusive club that needs to remain exclusive and fancy and put on this facade of glamour and fanciness, so there isn’t a lot of realness about it. 

Reflecting on my career now, I realize that none of my steps and career changes were perfectly planned out, none were super intentional beyond wanting to make more money - and none were completely life-altering that set me on a completely different course. 

But yet I still have stress sweated my way through frantically calling everyone in my contacts list to get opinions and to try and get someone to make my decision for me. 

Let’s list out and dissect all the things that manically run through your mind when you come to a crossroads in your career: compensation, equity, stage of company, company performance and brand equity, perks and benefits, your team/your manager, familiarity, your reputation. 

I have a complicated relationship with my anxiety. Anxiety has pushed me and has gotten me far in life. Moderate anxiety has kept me on my toes, driven me to tend to the things that I care about, and nudged me toward my best self. 

But anxiety plays dirty — oh it plays dirty. Anxiety has also driven me to take on more than I can handle, to dress rehearse tragedy and every bad scenario possible, to be stuck in flight/fight/freeze instead of healthily moving through the stress cycle. And it's driven me to try to over control everything in my corporate life, which is impossible, so I tried to control everything in my personal life = a ferocious scarcity mindset. 

In today's episode we talk about money anxiety, uncertainty anxiety, control anxiety, and status anxiety. It's time to evaluate what anxiety you have, where it comes from, how it has helped you in your life and career, but mostly importantly, what it has cost you.

Reorgs, "let's take this offline", Year of Transformation, executive departures, new CFO? There is definitely tea behind the "so and so is leaving the company to focus on family". 

Why do companies speak the way they do? Corporate speak is this weirdly formal language, ridiculous amount of buzzwords, and a focus on spinning positive messaging—all to put on a guise of professionalism and intellect, to lend credibility and worthiness to our jobs, to mitigate consequences. 

Corporate speak is a big reason why work can be so draining, so passive aggressive, so shaming, and why our meetings are longer than they need to be! We dig into what corporate speak is, reasons we use it, and what's hiding under the surface of all those buzzwords. 

Do you ever get this feeling of not getting a shot because of who you are or who you are not, or whether or not you’re in the “in crowd”? Corporate life is often just a clique game where there are “in crowds” and favorites and social hierarchy. There is nepotism, there are groups that spend more time together because of their similarities, their sameness, their shared life experience, their prior relationships, their interests, their upbringing, their beliefs. 

Surrounding yourself with people you like is part of life, but at work is where it can create really painful and high-stakes exclusion. Exclusion hurts on an individual level and it also impacts what our societies future looks like. 

Favoritism, nepotism, cliques, unspoken fraternities—all come from a good place of good intent (well mostly ha) of wanting to take care of those around you, those who are similar to you, those in your family—but can quickly turn into painful exclusion and discrimination. 

If I had a dollar for every time I’ve been called “organized” in my career, I would def own a boat by now. But you know what? It’s never felt like a compliment.

We use labels in work for many reasons: to get an upper hand on someone, to put that person down or on a lower playing field (again power dynamics), to put someone in a box that we feel more comfortable with. None of the reasons are great.

Perception is really all we have in business - who is perceived as the best leader, who is perceived as the best communicator, who is perceived to be a rockstar. Effectively combatting labels is a HUGE tool in managing your perception.

In this episode we talk about how to craft your perception with intention because that perception (how you are perceived by leadership, your manager, the CFO, the CEO) all will really dictate if you get selected for the high-profile project, if you are considered when asking for a raise, if you are considered for the next management role.

Chances are, you have encountered or will encounter toxic leadership in your career. If you're experiencing this, let me remind you: you are not crazy. Toxic leadership isn’t benign and you aren't just “overreacting" or "being too sensitive”. Toxic leadership creates environments of fear and low morale and that is traumatic. Spending 40+ hours in an environment like that is traumatic.

Toxic leadership is so incredibly tough, but....  kind of unavoidable. I do think there is some freedom in that realization. There is freedom is a radical understanding of where you end and others begin and letting go of everything that you can’t control. 

In today's episode we talk about how CEOs are faring right now in the media (** not well **), how to identify toxic leadership, and three paths forward. 

Also, listening to Taylor Swift’s Karma helps me too. Karma is a cat, purring in my lap cause it loves me.

Yes, I understand the irony. Me, someone who was fired most recently, giving you advice on getting ahead in your career. But I haven't been fired from a job since I worked at Abercrombie & Fitch, okay? 

I went from manager level to C-suite executive in 3 years and have a whole bunch of accolades and traumas to go with it... as well as some practical, real-talk advice on getting ahead in your career. 

How many companies do you come across that claim "we're making the world a better place" or "we take care of xyz so you can focus on what matters in life"? 

It’s also a question almost all of us are asked in the interview process “why do you want to work for xyz company” and this is usually a test on whether you’ve done your research by looking up the company website, consumed what they say is their mission/vision and whether that resonates enough for you to work there — whether that resonates enough for you to do the best work of your life so you can assure this recruiter/hiring manager that you will do the best work of your life because your motivators aren’t selfish things like money, security, job satisfaction — your motivators are altruistic because you genuinely want to help do whatever the company mission is whether you’re paid or not. 

Is this required? We dive into this idea of being passionate about your job and whether it's realistic, possible, or good for you.