Caroline shares upcoming Ascend-Bolster Panel and celebrating what you want more of.
Hello hello,
Just when I thought the grip of the pandemic was beginning to loosen, the month of June has already kicked my butt! Work has continued to be good but very busy, and there were also some significant health challenges for a very important person who does not want to be named. And to top it off, one of my kids (thankfully fully vaccinated as of this week!) ended up going into quarantine after being exposed at school to a classmate who tested positive for Covid-19. Sadly, we had to cancel all the fun plans we dared to make, and huddled in for one more stretch of movie nights at home.
My girl and me celebrating the end of another quarantine.
Photo credit: Chong Oh
You get what you celebrate.
As I hung out with my family, I thought about one of my favorite reminders from Frank Blake, former CEO of Home Depot, who said this on a Tim Ferris podcast episode I listened to a long time ago.
“You get what you celebrate. So celebrate what you want more of in your life”
We recently made plans for our first post-vaccination family vacation and the first one requiring a plane ride since 2019. More on that next month! I was thinking that I am usually good about celebrating family and friends, but not as good about appreciating and celebrating the kinds of clients and projects I want more of. I will be thinking about that some more on that long(ish) plane ride!
What are you celebrating and wanting more of at this halfway point of 2021?
Talking about the things “I” care about
As a coach, I have been trained to hold back my own thoughts or values in my coaching conversations and I have really internalized the idea that I’m a person to hold the space for others. Coaching is my number one work priority, so it was important to fold away my oversharing tendencies. Therefore I have not been sharing that much about the things I personally care about in a work setting for the last few years.
During the pandemic, as I have been doing more and more work of leading and hosting difficult but also empowering conversations for people of color at various nonprofits and tech companies, I have been able to bring in more of my personal experiences and thoughts to connect with people and to frame these conversations.
Model Minority Myth slide I used for my talk
One recent event was a talk I gave at a fintech company where I shared both my personal stories as a Korean American immigrant woman leader (I know, that’s a mouthful!) and brought in some concepts that I thought were really important for people to think about. One such example was the Asian model minority myth and its negative impact on Asian Americans. Just as importantly, we also discussed its negative impact on the struggle for racial equity in this country.
Putting together that talk felt like a synthesis of so many things that I am and that I care about, and it felt really great to have a large group of people, even if they were on Zoom, pay attention and respond enthusiastically via chat and even through Linkedin afterward. My high schooler happened to ask me how it went and he ended up having to sit through a sped-up version of the whole Powerpoint. Haha, poor kid. I’m sure he’s happy to be back at school more these days.
I am grateful to my partnership with Valia Glytsis of The Paradox of Leadership for always encouraging me to stretch the breadth of my work while putting me in front of audiences that I normally wouldn’t find myself.
Ascend-Bolster Panel: The Path to On-Demand Executive Work
Ascend - Bolster Panel on the Path to On-Demand Executive Work
Next week, I will be serving on a panel called: “The Path to On-Demand Executive Work” on Thurs, 6/17! This is a free event, hosted by Ascend Leadership, a Pan Asian executive organization, and Bolster, an on-demand executive talent marketplace. I wrote about Bolster in my Notes last month, which you can read about here. While I am brand new to Ascend, I am looking forward to learning more about their work. For one, I’m excited about their new Ascend 10x25 Initiative to increase AAPI directors on corporate boards.
On the panel agenda are future-of-work trends, the on-demand executive process, structure, and expectations so you can leverage advisory, project, interim, and fractional roles to advance in your career. I’m told there will be ample time for Q&A. I might just be the one asking most questions, to be honest!
I hope you can join us! You can register here. For those of you who can’t make it, I plan to take lots of notes and share back some insights and resources here next month.
Thanks for spending your precious time reading about what I’m working on, learning, and thinking about. As always, please write back and let me know what you are up to!
