How to Find Freedom for You and your Team at Work!

Let's talk about freedom. Freedom in your work and life for both yourself, but also your team members. When it comes to the workplace, we often feel constricted. We often feel confined to the way things are. But as a leader, you have an opportunity to really create the culture you want for yourself and for your team that may be able to liberate everyone to really pursue their passions while achieving the common goals that you have as a business. So we're gonna talk about finding work-life blend. We're gonna talk about pursuing your passions and really discovering your purpose and your why. Then we'll talk about finding white space in your life, not only on your calendar, but actually in your life and in your being that will really create a sense of freedom and a sense of breath. Breath. We'll talk about intrapreneurship. This is one of my favorite topics of discussion. And then how trust and openness can really rule basically in creating that very free, very trust-based, very creative environment for yourself and for your team members. And then lastly, to really challenge yourself to look at your weaknesses and your strengths and how you can leverage those strengths for yourself and for your team, but also what do you need to fill the gap of those weaknesses. All right, so we're finding freedom today.

Welcome, welcome, welcome to Shedding the Corporate Bitch, the podcast that transforms female corporate executives into powerhouse leaders by showing them how to shed the challenges and overwhelm along with any fear, insecurity, self-doubt, and negativity holding them back. I'm your host, Bernadette Boas of Ball of Fire Coaching, bringing you powerhouse discussions each week to share tips, advice, and sometimes tough love so you create the riches in your work and life you deserve.

So freedom, what does that look like for you in your work, in your life? Is it the fact that you have A lot of flexibility in your schedule, a lot of flexibility in the work that you do, a lot of flexibility in the relationships and the interactions and the opportunities that you can find for yourself in the workplace. Is it opportunities that even go beyond the confines of your team, maybe your department, your division, your business unit, even your industry, to really kind of leverage all the skills and talents, but also those interests and those passions that you have that may not even be part of your job. It's really valuable and viable that not only yourself, but also your team members really have that opportunity to understand what those passions, those interests, those skills, those talents are that go beyond the job description, right? And then how can you leverage those things for yourself and those individual team members to where it may kind of expand what it is your team's doing or enrich the day-in, day-out tasks, improve the results that you're achieving. In the meantime, all of you are feeling a lot more valued. You're contributing a great deal more. Not necessarily the amount of work, but just the fact that you're contributing more creativity, more ideas, more innovation, more problem solving, more decision making, more opportunities for delegating and creating projects and initiatives that move your business forward. So really, the first thing I want you to be thinking about is what is that work-life blend that you want to find? In your life? What does it look like? Now, I don't believe in work-life balance. I, I've yet to accomplish it myself, let alone a great deal of my clients. How I like to look at it is a blend. How do you blend what you do from a career perspective and then what you do and/or want to do in your life? So how do you create a blend that works not only for yourself, not only for your team members, but more so for your family, your friends, your community that you also spend a good amount of time and work effort in. So where do you find that blend? How can you incorporate the talents and the skills and the passions and interests you have in your day-in, day-out life? How can you actually leverage those in your work? So now you're blending those two things. You're not having to kind of separate your home life and your work life, you're actually able to bring them together. So for instance, over the last 4 or 5 years, I've started not only playing but competing in pickleball tournaments. And it's an addiction of mine. And if you don't know what pickleball is, just Google it and you'll find out. However, being in a team sport for the first time in many, many, many years, most of the work that I've done or the of the athletics that I've done have been individual. And it hasn't been since high school when I was a part of a field hockey team was that I was really involved in a team athletic sport. And so here over the last 4 or 5 years playing doubles in pickleball, I'm all of a sudden relying on my partner, but also they are relying on me, and therefore it's a team. And that has created a whole new set of ideas, strategies, mistakes, lessons learned, best practices, opportunities for me to kind of take what I experience in that teaming, whether it's even as far as drilling, practicing, let alone competing, and bring them into the work that I do. And using all of those teachings as part of even the work that I do with my clients within my own team, and then overall with my business. And so here I was able to bring my life into work. Another way of blending my work and life with— in this case, with pickleball— is when I do travel, like right now, out of town, and in my suitcase is two pickleball paddles. And I plan to actually go and find some games. As my kind of stress relief and physical activity. But at the same time, I'm also going to teach a couple of my clients how to play. And so here I'm able to bring my passion into the workplace and really feel a nice blend between the two. And the same could hold true for what you do in the workplace. You could actually bring into your home life, whether that's your home with your friends, with your community, with any hobbies or interests that you have, you could leverage the skills and the tasks and the competencies and the expertise and the experience that you have, you know, in the workplace, and you can leverage those in your home life and really create, again, another blend. So for instance, I spend all of my time at work as a coach and a consultant and a trainer, and I certainly, bring them into my home life, whether that is within my home, within my friends, within my family, even into the pickleball passion of mine. Because here I leverage all of my coaching and all of my training and work to help others. Just like I'm going to tonight with my client, work to help others learn the sport. But as a result of the fact that I just absolutely love to coach and train others, So what can you be doing to really find a nice blend between your work and your life? That also comes down to kind of how you schedule yourself, where your priorities lie, what you're willing to give up, sacrifice, or compromise, but what you're not willing to give up, sacrifice, or compromise as a result. And so that could mean your family obligations, your community obligations, your expectations or your boundaries you've set from a work perspective. Today with some clients, we were even talking about the communication between team members across different shifts and the use of technology today with texts and emails and phone calls, group text or individual, can either support you and your team members, or it can kind of create a lot of havoc and stress and anxiety when all of a sudden, when they're not at the workplace, people are intruding because of the technology into their, their home life. And therefore, what can you do to better manage that for not only yourself, but your team members? And lastly, when it comes to work-life blend, is to really help your team members also to ensure that they are focusing on taking care of themselves as well. Because we all know the, you know, the old adage that, you know, put the mask on yourself first before helping others. And that's simply because until you take care of yourself, you can't really show up to really take care of the people around you at home or at work. And so really also as a leader, help your team members to find that blend Make sure that they are taking their lunch breaks, that they're nourishing themselves, that they're getting enough sleep, that they're able to take vacations or day offs to refuel and really be able to then show up in the best way possible. All right? The next thing would be to find your passions. Many people that I talk to at all levels of an organization will tell me they really don't know what their true passions are. Or on the flip side, I'll find those that have reached a different milestone in their life. It often happens when someone's like turning a major age, 40, 50, or 60. It could be when they're in career transition and all of a sudden they have an opportunity to kind of look at their life, look at their work and their career passions, and really figure out what is it that they really want to be doing for themselves. Obviously, retirement is another key milestone where people start looking at what's really important to them. And as they are looking and asking themselves various questions around what's important to them, what do they want, what do they not want, who are they, who do they want to be, what is it that they really want to achieve in their lifetime, what's on their bucket list, what are their true passions, that's when they really start discovering more and more about themselves. And then they can ask themselves, why do I want this purpose? Why do I have these passions and these interests? Why is it that I'm going to work so hard at doing X and really get down to the emotional reason, the emotional why? You know, it's not just so you can take vacations or buy that nice house or to put your kids through school or just to be financially secure. It's not about that. Underneath that, much deeper, is the real why, the emotional why that you want to connect to. You want to leave a legacy. You want to feel fulfilled. You want to find happiness and real joy. You want to be able to wake up in the morning and look out and, you know, really see the sunrise for what it is, not just the fact that it's something that you take for granted and happens every morning. But really, what is that why? Why. And let me give you an example of this that just hit me to the core the other day. I was flying back from California this past Friday, and I was sitting next to a gentleman who happened to be reading this self-help book. And I was busy, you know, away working on something from, from the week's worth of work, and took a break, kind of was sitting there. It's a 4.5-hour flight. So the next thing I know, I noticed the name of the book and that it was indeed a self-help book. So I happened to turn to him and ask him kind of what was the reasoning for him to be reading this particular book. And it was all about finding a better tomorrow today. And so he said, well, and he's an older gentleman, I should say that. You'll understand the reason why. So he says, well, It might sound a little cruel as to why, his why. He said, "However, I work to stay very fit and very healthy because I don't want my wife to be here left without a husband to where she would have to then live without me, but also live on her own and try to work her way through the world after being together for so long on her own." So I want to stick around longer than my wife and allow me to feel the pain and the emptiness and the loneliness and not her. Well, hell, what a why is that? Crazy, huh? But he discovered, and he said he's only really discovered that in the last like 5 to 6 years, and he's discovered that to be his core why. So think about for you, what is your why? And that will create so much freedom for yourself. And you could do the same exercise with your team, asking them individually and collectively, why are we doing the work that we're doing? Why are you doing this particular work that you're doing? Why is it important for you to be good at what it is that you do? Why is it important for you to collect this paycheck? Why is it important for you to make a difference amongst the team within the company, so forth and so on. So help each other to really find not only your work-life blend and your purpose, but also that why. Then I mentioned to find white space. White space means two things. One can be very technical. Find the white space in your calendar. Leave yourself time in your calendar that is not full. That's white space. To where you can fill it with meditation, a walk, a phone call to a friend, you know, a lunch out of the office. Find that white space. At the same time, it also means to find space within your mind and your heart by releasing and shedding those things that are not working for you, those people and places and things, to where then you have space within your mind and within your heart to fill it with other things that bring you joy and happiness. And that will also help you find freedom. Now, I talked about intrapreneurship being a favorite subject of mine, and we'll actually do a future discussion on this. But what I mean by this is even when you work for another company, find those opportunities that maybe someone else isn't addressing. Maybe it's a problem. Maybe it's something that's broken. Maybe it's an opportunity that you think would be really beneficial for the company and Go ahead and pursue it. Go and seek the sponsorship and the support to say, "Hey, look, I think this needs to be solved or looked at or created or innovated, and I'd love to take it on." And so, intrapreneurship is also just about trying new things, taking risks, and really adding, even if you can't kind of move from one position to another position to do that thing, you're allowing yourself to kind of work outside the box, outside the norm of what it is that you typically do day in and day out. And therefore, it's bringing you a lot more joy and fulfillment and value, and you just feel like you have more of a purpose than just doing the same old thing that you might be doing on a regular basis. So entrepreneurship is a mindset to really just look for those opportunities. And that could be a break in the, in the process, a gap in how the business operates. It could be a new creative idea, um, that hasn't been considered before. So kind of try to get out of just being heads down in what it is that you're supposed to be doing so you could check it off the list and kind of get creative because that will give you so much freedom and so much a sense of creativity, innovation, and excitement and energy to where it also lends itself to you not only finding that work-life blend, but that passion, that why, that white space. You will find more and more freedom. If you allow your team members to do the same, to act as an intrapreneur, bring you new ideas, bring you solutions, bring you different avenues that you and the team could be taking, then everyone feels energized and motivated and really excited to show up every day and then contribute and go over and beyond. And lastly, none of us as leaders especially, but even our team members, should go a day without really considering where our strengths lie and where our weaknesses are. So the strengths we want to recognize are— we want to recognize them because we want to be able to enrich what it is that we're doing and leverage those talents, those skills, those experiences, that expertise, those encounters as a way to enhance and enrich what it is that we're doing. So you leverage your strengths, and then you need to really also understand your weaknesses. Whether that's through your own self-assessment, it's through a 360 assessment, it's through your performance feedback, whatever the case might be, and work to fill the gap. If it is a weakness and it's something that is critical to your role or important to your role, or it will just simply enhance your role, then take the time and seek out the resources and the support that you need to pursue filling that gap. So all of these different strategies will allow you to embed into your culture, even if it's just your team culture, let alone the company culture, a sense of freedom for yourself and for your people to really go beyond the average, go beyond the status quo, go beyond just showing up and doing the job, and it will bring so much excitement and motivation and inspiration and energy and focus and determination to yourself and to your team members to where you'll, you'll make yourself unstoppable as individuals and as a team to accomplish the goals that you have. All right, so find work-life blend. Do that through finding your purpose, finding your why, really understanding the passions and the interests that you have that go beyond what you typically do at work or at home day in and day out, and then find that white space so you can actually pursue those passions and interests and build a foundation of trust and openness. And if we haven't talked about that, that's really ensuring that all your team members really feel safe to be open, to give feedback, critical or easy, to create, to innovate, to solve problems, to debate, to rumble. So creating that trust and openness in your environment will also create that freedom because then people aren't apprehensive. They don't feel like there's going to be retaliation or ridicule or judgment, and they just feel so liberated to contribute and to add value, even when their ideas might be shot down.

All right?

And then we talked about intrapreneurship, creating those new ideas and really thinking outside the box. So then you can really lean on your strengths to enrich what it is that you're doing each and every day, helping your team members to find their strengths, as well as identifying the weaknesses so all of you can fill the gap and have that freedom that you're looking for in your work and in your life. I'd also love to hear your comments or your questions. So go out onto LinkedIn and anywhere you see one of the live videos or audios along with our quote cards that we distribute and leave a comment and let me know, and I'd be more than happy to share back some tips and ideas for you. All right, so until next week, take care everyone.

Bye.