Ambition Isn’t The Problem. Misalignment Is, with Bianca D'Alessio

Do you know what it takes to shift from goal-driven leadership to identity-led leadership? According to our guest Bianca D'Alessio, the star of HBO Max's series Selling the Hamptons, the top-ranked real estate broker in New York City and the state, and the author of Mastering Intentions: 10 Practices to Amplify Power and Lead with Lasting Impact. Instead of asking, what do I need to achieve next? Leaders should ask, who am I becoming? Truly impactful leaders focus instead on clarity, consistency, and future casting. Setting an intention and making daily decisions in alignment with it enables us to become the person and build the legacy for enduring success. Bianca shares with us why real growth requires intention, not just ambition. How teamship elevates leadership through shared purpose and cultural accountability. Learn more about Bianca, go to biancadalesio.com.

Welcome to Shedding the Corporate Bitch, the podcast that transforms today's managers into tomorrow's powerhouse leaders. Your host, Bernadette Boas, executive coach and author, brings you into a world where the corporate grind meets personal growth and success in each and every episode. Let's do this.

Bianca, welcome, welcome. How are you?

I am so awesome and I'm so excited to be here.

Why is the subject of ambition misalignment and mastering intentions so close to your heart?

I love that we're starting here. I have always been one of those like very ambitious, go-getter, type A, very goal-oriented and driven people. And as my professional success continued to grow and my team and making more money and doing all of the things, right? Checking all of the boxes of all the things I wanted to accomplish. I just realized like I, I wasn't feeling aligned. I wasn't feeling inspired. I was having the accomplishments, but was the emotion that was attached to it was like, okay, that's another accolade or that's another key milestone. It, the process of who I was becoming in the process started getting lost. And so I had to really pull back onto, I'm accomplishing these things, but who is the person behind the woman who's accomplishing these milestone moments? Why do I feel empty? Why do I feel misaligned? Why am I feeling unresolved in what I'm accomplishing? And I started really doing the inner work to figure out why that was. And I think that's something that so many of us start to experience, right? We're showing up, we're clocking in, we're clocking out, we're looking at what other people are doing, and we're feeling empty in where we are in our lives. We're feeling confused as to our purpose in this world.

And despite these successes, right? And the business.

Yes.

On in the big house.

Yes, exactly. You have all of the things, you have the accomplishments show, but like, why am I not feeling good? Why am I not feeling whole? And so I went on this whole journey of trying to figure out what that was. And once I found my alignment, once I found my intention, once I started changing and focusing on, instead of setting the goal, focusing on the feeling, the woman that I wanted to become, the person I wanted to become, the leader I was striving to be. Once I focused on that mission, the way that I was accomplishing the goals totally changed and the feelings behind them shifted dramatically. And it's all of a sudden, like, I stepped into my power. I started becoming magnetic. Like, everything changed. My relationships, the way I was leading, the way the confidence that I had. And so to me, like, that is was the biggest turning point personally and professionally. And when you could create that alignment between your personal and your professional lives, life, like when it all starts to work together, like the joy, the happiness, the relief, everything changes, everything changes, and the sky becomes the limit. Wow.

And what I loved when I did background on you is you also talk about the fact that the most important question isn't what do I need to do to achieve my goals? It's actually who am I becoming?

Yes.

So does that stem from all of this work that you have done and how did that change your life?

Yeah. And like, I think the way that I was measuring the metric of success, right? It became so finite. It became what is the number? What is like a finite point that I was focusing on. I stopped focusing on the journey that it took me to get there. And as an entrepreneur, as a business owner, as a leader, as a woman, the journey of self-discovery, the failures and the mistakes and what they teach you about yourself, there is so much more in that. Than accomplishing the milestone moment. And we don't look at that process. We don't give it enough credit, but that's everything. Like, like the discipline and the tenacity and the res— of res— of resilience that was required, required in order to achieve the thing that you achieved. That's the heart of it all. And so I just started shifting my mindset of like, how am I focusing and how am I framing my failures? How am I reshaping the goals and the intentions that I'm setting myself to focus on the process, to focus on the journey, to focus on each misstep along the way and what that taught me and how that made me better and how that programmed a muscle memory in me. So when I go to accomplish and achieve the next thing, when I set the goal to be even higher, I have that learned experience behind me. Giving me the confidence and the stability, knowing that I can achieve it.

So when you do struggle again, which we all will, we all do, we all will, we bang our heads up against the wall, which we will again and again. You're saying that all that history, all those lessons, I loved when you said reframing and reframing your failures, you're reframing them into what do I, what can I take from them? What, how has it allowed me to grow? How has it taught me about myself? All of those things.

Oh, absolutely. Like I even, I've changed my relationship with failure entirely. I seek it. I seek failure because the moment that you stop failing is the moment that you become complacent because you're not doing something that's outta your comfort zone. You become really good at it. You're gonna keep succeeding. So in order to grow, in order to reach the next limit, the next height, The next challenge, you need to fail at it. You need to fail at it a few times before you get good at it. And so that became almost like something that I'm looking for, right? How do I push myself out of my comfort zone? When does the failure start again? So I know that I'm, I have to try harder. I have to work hard. I have to try something different and be creative.

Now, but when you say work harder and try harder, you're not saying kill yourself to the bone.

Think differently. Think outside of the box. It's The, I talked about muscle memory a few minutes ago, but just because you've done something in the past and it's worked doesn't always mean it's the right way to do it. So when you have that next opportunity, how do you challenge yourself to be more creative, to take that next step, to really test? For me, so often, figure out how do I test my leadership skills? How do I try something different to connect with people differently? And that's been a really big Part of the last few years as I was writing my book and as I've been building my business, so many people, so many coaches, so many mentors I had kept telling me like to be the strong, stoic, have it all together leader. That's what people aspire to be like.

You know what?

I realized that there was a big flaw in that. Like being perfect all of the time just preaches perfectionism. It kills your creativity. It doesn't allow people to step outside of their comfort zone and it makes you unapproachable. So I changed the, I changed it. I said, you know what, I'm gonna start leading with vulnerability. What does that look like? How does that change the way that I connect with my people and have them be more ingrained in the work that we're doing here, more aligned with the mission and the purpose of what we're trying to do, but make it feel, enhance the camaraderie, get the team spirit going because they feel like they show up and it's not just coworkers that they wanna say hi and bye to., but it's people who are, they're co-creating life with. Right. And so that became one of those really cool ways of how do I do something different from what I'd done before that had worked and maybe it hadn't worked. How do I rewrite the script?

Now there's a lot of individuals out there, professionals, and some of them, a lot of them will call themselves leaders who are very stoic, robotic, very rigid, very around the perfection. And they're listening to us because this was me 15 years ago and they're listening to us and going, wah wah, this is all woo-woo stuff and my belonging and what, what am I becoming? What do you say to them to shake them loose and help them get into a mindset where they can start really asking themselves the tough questions, the hard questions, the questions they probably have never asked themselves about. Regards to what they truly want in life.

Do you feel lit up when you walk through the doors to go to work every day? Do you want to be there? Do you love the people that you sit next to? You don't have to agree with everything they do, but do you enjoy their presence? Are you inspired by the work that they're doing? Listen, there's no doubt there's certain corporate environments and companies where this robotic, militant, rigid structure. It works because it's been ingrained and it's the culture and the fabric of the company. But if you are not feeling fulfilled by the work that you're doing, if you're not enjoying the people that you're sitting with, you are going to reach a ceiling of your growth. And if you want to stay there, that's fine. But if you want to see what is possible when you can do more, when you feel more, when you are in alignment, That's when everything will open up for you.

When you say they hit that ceiling of growth. Yeah. Isn't there a danger too that it's not even about their growth in their career or their position, but also the danger is how it starts projecting out into their teams, into the culture, and even into their lives personally.

I'm so happy you ended with even into their lives personally. And I love that so much because I struggled with this a few years ago too, where I was like checking into work and I was one person and then I was trying to leave and go home and become a totally different person. And it created an identity crisis for myself of who am I really? Because I'm seen in one light here and I'm seen in a different light to these people. And who is Bianca? If someone asked, my answer would be different for all of these groups of people. That is, was a misalignment in and of itself. Now, I'm not saying, of course you have to maintain your professionalism at work and you could be a little more carefree and fun, but if you really wanna connect with people, you have to connect with people on a people level. That's a, that is where you're going to find, gosh, the depth, right? I talked about being sticky before, like. You could be surface level, but like you could only go so far surface. You wanna really inspire people, you wanna really move people, you really wanna have loyalty and commitment to your workforce. You can't connect surface level, you just can't. And the, 'cause then the only thing for why your people are showing up is their paycheck. And if that's enough, then that's enough. But if you wanna push your people to dream bigger, to be more inspired, you have to connect with them on a personal level. Absolutely.

And those individuals, those managers slash leaders who don't, what message would you have for them?

The world's changing. The corporate environment is changing. And we've seen that in the past very few years. We are slowly being replaced by technology and computers. The more robotic you continue to be, the more you start to operate like a machine. You wanna be different. You wanna have people who wanna work for people. You wanna keep the human element of the workforce and the future. Like, you have to become more human.

And I would tell 'em quite honestly that if they don't wanna be a people person, then don't be a manager.

There you go.

I'd flat out, that's what I would say. Now, now that said, Because your book, Mastering Intentions: 10 Practices to Amplify Power and Lead with Lasting Impact, that to me was also talking about the fact that you may be in this current state of maybe a robot, maybe not a people person, not connecting, not engaging, not being open and authentic and vulnerable. Doesn't mean that you can't shift and change and transform, right? Oh yeah.

No way. If, gosh, that's why this book is, it's so deeply personal to me cuz it's, they're all practices that I have used to drastically transform my personal, professional, my everything. And it all starts, the whole book starts with self-awareness and the life experience, experiences that have shaped us to become the person that we are today. And how we show up in the world. We all have our own story. We all have our own trauma. We are all going through good times and bad times. The— that is how we show up in the world. But just because we have a past that has defined who we were up until this point in time, it does not have to define our future if we don't want it to. If we want more, we have the control, we have the power to rewrite it any point in time. It is in our control to change our lives today. It is in our lives to get rid of generational programming that we experienced from our family. And if we came from a family of non-communicators and say, you know what, I wanna learn how to better communicate with my partner and with my kids and with my team, it's in our ability to do that. It all starts with, with one recognizing where that comes from. And the book walks you through this process. And then making the decision that you want to make that change and coming to true clarity of why do I want that? Why am I seeking this? Why am I ready for this? Because once you make those commitments to yourself, then you can start doing the work on how do I start to become better at this?

Why I love that so much is what we try to strive for here in the Shedding the Corporate Bitch community is to help people not reach the point of no return, so to speak.

Yeah.

Uh, proactively identify those triggers and those signals and those symptoms that are getting them to that point. So I absolutely love that.

Yeah. And I want to, this came from, it was 2 years after I had started my current company. I was going on my first vacation since I had started the company with my brother and sister. And at that point in time, I was, as we are when we start a new business, head was down, hadn't looked up, was just going so focused. And I remember going out to dinner. It was one of the first nights we were on the trip and my siblings had an intervention with me pretty much saying, Bianca, we don't like the person you've become. You're unrecognizable. You're exhausted every time you're with us. You're like the shell, a shell of a person. You don't put the phone down. You can't relax. Your laugh is fake. Are you okay? What's going on in there? And if you don't start to be more considerate and more aware and part of our lives and make an effort, we're not going to want you in ours. And to me, if you like ask me, what was the purpose of why am I trying to build my business? It was to provide and to create something incredible for my family that I could be proud of. So I could, so I can support and grow and everything. My siblings are my two best friends. Yeah. And that was like, that was my rock bottom intervention moment where I was like, I need to pull myself out of this. Like I'm burning the most important relationships to me because I can't pull my head up and look at the bigger picture of why I'm trying to do this. And that was the point where I didn't know how I was gonna make the change at that point in time. I just knew I needed to make a change. So it is possible at any point in time when you have that moment, change is possible. And always, I always say small steps, big dreams, but small steps. You gotta start small.

Love that. And it's so funny because I didn't have an intervention. I actually went to my 5 sisters and their mother and asked them to write down on a piece of paper every attribute and thought that they had of me, good, bad, or ugly. And trust me, it was some ugly. It was good and really ugly. But it was such a self-discovery moment. And I think your intervention was the same. And therefore there's tools and there's people that people can go to, wouldn't you say, to say to them, how would you describe me? How am I showing up? What am I doing right or not doing completely is what Would you recommend that type of discussion?

I like, I love what you did. That's amazing. Going to the people who are closest to you, but I would also say you go to the peoples who are closest to you. This is hard for some people who don't have the most supportive family structure, especially when they're growing a business. Also go to friends, go to the people you respect, go to the people you trust, go to the people who will be honest with you. And ask them in the workplace, your friends, your family, anyone you have who you could ask for an opinion. I love that so much.

Yeah.

And I think like getting, I think that's easier if you're not in the point of full self-awareness. I did a very similar exercise for myself where I wrote down who I wanted to be to all of the people in my world. And I started thinking about like, how do I be a better sister? What do I need to do to be a better sister? What do I need to be a better daughter? What do I need to do to be a better partner? But that I would say is almost step 2. I love yours as step 1 of getting the opinion of others first to, to help you course correct.

I wish someone did an intervention for me years before. I would've saved a lot of pain for everyone, including myself.

So I have to ask, when you did that, did you reach like a rock bottom moment or was it Like just a random day that you thought this would be a fun act? Like how did that come?

Oh no, I was fired cuz I was a bitch and I needed to understand that cuz I didn't see myself.

Yeah.

The way it's kind of culminated and I needed proof and my 5 sisters are the most honest, loving, trusting people I could ask and they didn't hold back. Let me just say that it took a couple cocktails, but they didn't hold back. Let's get to some of the leadership aspects of what it is that we're talking about. The one is you introduce the concept of teamship, like a high evolution of leadership. Can you explain that?

As I was writing this book, there's, I feel like so many self-help books focus on the individual, the self. What can I do to become better? How can I show up? Differently in the world? How do I concentrate more, be more disciplined? But life is not a solo sport. We co-create life with the people who are all around us. So this book is written in a lens of both what can I do for myself, but how do I bring everyone else, my companions as I call them, along on the journey with me? How do you make sure your spouse is in alignment with what you are doing, not just at home, professionally, how do you make sure if you identify your parents as being that important relationship or your children, your partner in business, your leadership team, how do you make sure that you are getting people along on the journey of self-discovery and self-help? So it's not just for you and the individual, but the collective. That is the only way you have that maximum impact. Because if you're just doing everything and you're not sharing your knowledge, Well, then you're leaving them out for themselves to figure it out. You're gonna create distance no matter what relationship you're in. So how do we bridge the gap? How do we do that through teamship of co-creating and going through these exercises and these practices together?

And it does build a more inclusive, connected team.

Oh, absolutely. And trust. The root of it becomes trust and listen and, and There's so few people who, you know, at least in my world, and I would imagine most of the people who are listening that are around you that they're like, I don't want to become better. They may not know how to become better, but most people want to become better. Most people want a better life. Most people want to learn something. Not everyone may be willing to do the hard work, but most people want that. Sometimes it's just a matter of showing them, giving them the option, making it a little bit less daunting and scary and giving them a support structure in order to be able to do that.

I love that. Because I can imagine a number of our listeners and viewers who are itching to find this gold nugget that you and I have found, but yet they're not sure where to start.

Oh yeah. Listen, communities is huge. And I've sought out various communities. I love what you said.

Your community.

There are so many communities out there. You just have to find your tribe. And I think that's another huge leadership topic of, I think I've, I used to try to figure out like, how do I become the person for everybody and change my leadership? No, I know exactly who I am and I am okay with not being for everyone because my tribe My people get me so intensely. It's just incredible. And the people who don't, they don't wanna be part of it. That's okay. And so having that like moment of recognition as well. So find your tribe, find your people. And yeah, I love building my tribe. So come on in, let's do it together.

But let's hit on, let's hit on it's okay.

Yeah.

Because for some people it's not okay. They wanna, they They want everybody to like them. They think as a, if they are a leader, everybody should like them. But there's a big difference between being liked and being respected. So, speak on that even as far as your own experience.

Yeah. Showing up, doing the work, having values, disciplines, practices, that's what will get you the respect, right? Striving to continue to enhance the environment. To do what you say you're gonna do, to show up for people. But it's okay to not be liked for everyone. Like, you're supposed to have a personality. I have a certain intensity about me that's freaking intense. That's okay. Some people just don't wanna be that intense, but there's no one that's gonna be like, yeah, Bianca doesn't do the work. There's no way. Like, I know exactly what I bring to the table and I'm respected for that. So like, I think Where you find your clarity on that is like knowing what you're bringing to the table and how you're showing up. And then listen, especially for people pleasers, this is super difficult to like, to come to terms with the fact that you may not be liked by everyone, but you gotta disarm that. Like how the people you are liked by. Will really value the things that you value about yourself. You have to hold onto that when they're, when you have the naysayers who, you know, say you should be more of this or less of that, or do this instead, or do that instead. It goes back to really like coming to the root of who are you? How do you show up? What do you bring to the table?

And what do you wanna, what kind of experience do you wanna create for other people? Totally. The minute I let go of needing to have everyone like me, Oh my God. It was the most liberating thing in the world. It was the most freeing thing. I felt like I lost like 1,000 pounds.

I know it is very liberating.

Yeah. Now, what would you say to someone who is now in the throes of it?

Mm-hmm.

Uh, they're getting resistance.

Mm-hmm.

Like you said earlier, you said something to the effect of, there's some people you don't, especially when it comes to starting a business. They don't necessarily want to go to and use them for their insights. So when someone is in the throes of it and they're getting resistance from the people that are their inner circle and they're pushing on them not to change, because we know why that is, what, how, what would you say to them to keep pushing and again, get rid of the worrying about what other people think?

This is, I would say it's multifaceted. First of all, my opinion always is to never get perfectionistic. Professional advice or an opinion unless someone has done it better, smarter, faster, more intently than I have. If someone hasn't achieved the thing or done the thing, I'm not going to get their professional opinion on what course of action I should take. Now, that's also difficult when you have a family, when you're in a partnership, when you have people who are depending on you and you really care about the opinions of— and I was in that relationship when I started my business. I was in that relationship with someone who didn't understand what I was doing and why I was doing it. And I had to come to terms with what I was willing to sacrifice in order to grow my business and what I was willing to sacrifice in order to become the person that I knew I wanted to become. And it did come at the cost of my relationship, but that was a choice that I made, I knew was right for me. And that's a very difficult conversation because as you're growing your business and your relationships change, they will go through difficult periods and times. Being very clear on where your priorities are, what you're willing to sacrifice, when you're willing to sacrifice it. And then, and then you seek that next level of who should I go to and whose opinion should I respect and trust and appreciate and turn to when I need it.

No, absolutely love that. So bringing it full circle back to misalignment, that ambition isn't the problem. It's misalignment. What does misalignment look like to someone so they can start diagnosing themselves?

I'm not, I wouldn't say I'm a woo person, but I'm talking a lot about feelings today. Are you feeling empty? Are you feeling confused? Are you feeling lost? Are you looking at the clock or wishing days would go by or waiting for hours to pass? Trying to figure out the root of why am I wanting to rush time?

Gosh.

Now I just remember being there so clearly of, okay, next month, next year, next week.

Okay.

I can't wait for later today. Now I'm like, gosh, I wish I could live in this moment longer. Have this day longer. Yeah, I can't wait for certain points in time in the future, but I'm definitely not wishing life by because gosh, does it move really fast.

Yes.

And so I would say that's the biggest thing. If you don't feel at peace, if you are just rushing through things, through life, through experiences, that is when you're probably in a mis— in a misalignment.

And for me it was, I was on the couch. I did not want to get up and actually go into work. When I went into work, I was late or I made excuses to stay home. Home, all of that.

And that's not you, and that's not who you are as a person. Like, what I— that's why I have really intent, like, daily check-ins, weekly check-ins, just to see, like, where's my mental state. And just because I'm saying all of this right now does not mean I don't go through moments or lows. Like, I just— you're getting me. I just came off of a health and wellness retreat this past week. But last week I was like, normally I'm like start of the year, go. This year my holiday looked a little bit different. I came back, I was feeling a little bit lazy and like, I'm literally, I feel like I'm starting my year yesterday. It was when I got back, but that's also okay. Right. Like I needed to do a check-in. That, and also give yourself grace. That is okay. But I needed to do a check-in with myself. Why am I feeling lethargic? Why am I experiencing brain fog? That's not me. Why am I unmotivated to get up and go? Why am I go slower on email than normally? Like small things, right? Because high performers, we still do the thing, but we may not be doing it to our full ability or our full capacity. And once you start to notice that, like, those are the small slips before it goes too far of, okay, something's off. I am misaligned. I literally, I checked myself out in New York. I went down to Florida, I did a whole retreat, and I came back and I'm like, all right, ready to go. That's it. You got to give yourself what your body and your mind are asking for. Oh, I love that.

It is so true. One last tip. What would you tell our listeners and viewers that they could be doing right now to not worry about the ambition being a problem, but to figure out their alignment and master their intentions.

First of all, get clear on your story. Who are you? How do you show up? Literally write it down, write your life story down. And it is never too late to change that, to change where you want to go, to use your story to empower others, to use your story to connect to others, because there it is, literally your superpower. The sum of the experiences that you have had to date. All of us, every single person out there. It is what makes us incredibly and fascinatingly unique. Use it. Use it to connect. Use it to grow. Use it to share. And you will find, you'll find that alignment.

Love it! Everyone, please go to her website, biancadalesio.com. Learn all about her amazing background and the work that she's doing. Also her book. Mastering Intentions: 10 Practices to Amplify Power and Lead with Lasting Impact. You can also get that on Amazon. You can follow her on LinkedIn and Instagram as well. Bianca D'Alessio. Bianca, thank you so much. I appreciate you being here.

This was amazing. Thanks so much for having me on.

You're very welcome. I can't thank Bianca enough for sharing so openly and vulnerably her own journey in recognizing how she got misaligned with what her true passions, values, beliefs, and overall ambitions are. And I agree, ambition is not the problem. Us losing sight of what's important to us, that's when we can get ourselves into trouble. I hope you found even one nugget of a tip or strategy that she discussed that you could be taking and acting on right now so you can get in alignment with what it is that you truly want to create in this one life that you have that goes very fast. And if you enjoyed this episode, please share it with your colleagues, team members, friends, and family, and let them also identify what might be missing in their life and in their work. So they too can become powerhouse leaders in both their work and life. And be sure to follow the show. You can go to ballifiercoaching.com/podcast and follow on any one of your streaming services or on our Shed the Corporate Bitch TV YouTube channel. I look forward to having you for another episode of Shedding the Corporate Bitch.

Bye.

Thank you for tuning into today's episode of Shedding the Corporate Bitch. Every journey taken together is another step towards unleashing the powerhouse powerhouse leader within you. Don't miss any of our weekly episodes. Subscribe to our podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you love to listen. And for those who thrive on visual content, catch us on our Shedding the Bitch YouTube channel. Want to dive deeper with Bernadette on becoming a powerhouse leader? Visit balloffirecoaching.com to learn more about how she helps professionals, HR executives, and team leaders elevate overall team performance. You've been listening to Shedding the Corporate Bitch with Bernadette Boas. Until next time, keep shedding, keep growing, and keep leading.