Nabeela Ixtabalan Recap: The Art of Compassionate Leadership

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Welcome back to the Lead On Purpose podcast. It's that time when I drop the key leadership highlights from our previous episode. So I had Nabila Xtabilan on the show. She's the Chief People Officer at Walmart Canada. She oversees over 100,000 staff members. Look, I want to share with you the top three takeaways. So grab pen and paper or pop it on a note on your phone and see if you can implement one of these strategies or insights into your life or into your leadership. And hey, please don't forget, if you're on Apple right now, listening on Apple Podcasts, please do me a huge favorite, leave me a rating and review. And if you're on any platform and you enjoy the show, please think about one friend that might enjoy it and share and copy that link and share it to them. So here we go. Number one, well being is a catalyst for growth right there. I would say most CEOs would go, no way. Focusing on well being cost me money. But the way Nabila looks at this, when we focus on wellbeing, our retention rates are so much better, our staff morale, our company culture, everything benefits. And when you've got happy, connected, valued staff that's going to reflect in the growth of your company when you've got such high turnover because mental well being and you know intra staff connection is at an all time low, it's going to cost you. You can't grow at exponential rates. When you've got staff who feel undervalued, who feel over overwhelmed, burnt out, stressed. You've got to really focus on well being in your company culture. Second takeaway, if we ask someone how they are, we need to be interested in the real answer. That hit me when Nabila said that. I thought often I'll say hey, how's it going? And someone will start going off about how they truly are and you're like, oh yeah, yeah. But I don't have the five minutes to truly. I just wanted you to Say good and let's keep moving. I have been guilty of that for sure. If you're listening right now. Have you been guilty of that where you just say, hey, how's it going? Expecting a good and then just moving on? Well, Nabila is saying, like, we need to be prepared as leaders to ask, hey, how are you? And then wait and expect an honest answer. And same comes from a leader. When someone asks how you are, try not to say good. Say, I'm really focused on an important task right now and I feel like I can't give everyone the energy they need. Or you know what, I've got a lot on my plate right now, personally and professionally. Yeah, I feel like there's a lot on my shoulders. Be vulnerable as a leader. Be honest when someone asks you how you are and share that, that's something I'm going to work on for sure. And hopefully, you know, if you're listening right now, that's something you can think about with your loved ones, with your colleagues, your staff, your leaders. When you ask them, truly want to know, truly be interested. The third big takeaway was this. We need to demonstrate as leaders that we can both achieve success professionally and holistically take care of ourselves. So you can achieve things in a professional sense, but not at the expense of your own well being. And so it's really important to demonstrate to all of our staff, all of the people around us, people in our family, our friends, that, hey, we can achieve success and holistically take care of ourselves. Now that means you've got to do the work. What I mean by that is you've got to go and get that therapy session. If you're that person who has anger management, if you're that person who spends time in the negative mindset, who gets low and stays low for a while, who reacts really aggressively to things, who maybe gets withdrawn and cold shoulders, people, hey, that's a sign there's work to do. We've all got work to do. And getting the right therapist is a great start. So many of the CEOs I interview, high performing athletes, world leaders, they all admit to getting ongoing therapy and often it's preventative therapy, but at times it's retrospective. So think about what you need to do to succeed, not only professionally, but holistically with your own well being. Do you need a coach? Do you need a really amazing accountability group of friends who can get together and be really honest, be radically honest about how you're feeling, what support you might need? Do you need to have Someone who can help you communicate better. There's a great book if you haven't got it. It's the Atlas of the Heart. The Atlas of the Heart. And it's by Brene Brown. Absolutely brilliant. And it talks about all of the different emotions, how we label them, how we think about them, what they mean. I recommend, you know, if you have some areas of improvement in terms of well being, please go and grab that book. Absolutely brilliant book. I'm sure you can grab it on Amazon. Just Google Atlas of the Heart. Brene. Brian. So, guys, hope you enjoyed those takeaways. And you are a leader. If you're listening to this, you are a leader. You, you might lead your family, you might lead a friend. You know, there's young people, old people in between, people who listen to this podcast. For you young people, you might be a leader in your class, you might just lead. One person, one friend might look to you to see what your response is, how you react to things. For those here who are mums and dads, you are leaders of your family. For those of you who are running companies, you are leading the people around you. For those people you know that are going into shops and, you know, buying things and interacting with people, you are leading by getting in and chatting to people and being curious, you're leading. You're showing other people how it is to be respectful, curious, interested. So never underestimate the power of developing your leadership. So for now, I want you to get out there and lead your life on purpose.

Sam.