What is your leadership story?

Sep 19

*Every leader has a story, comprised of people, places, and experiences that have left a mark.*

What are your defining moments?

My husband and I were listening to Good Food on KCRW with Evan Kleiman, the episode called "The life and times of Lalo García: immigration, deportation, reconciliation". Wow! What an incredible life story, told in four distinct parts. It got me thinking about how we think about our own lives and what defining moments organize them into chapters.

How did I get here?

"My life in thirds" is a team-building exercise I've done often in my past life and I don't think I've ever told my story the same way twice. Some of this is because my present moment is always changing and what gives defining moments a thread - a story line - is the present moment: How did I get here? And we are usually better at spotting a defining moment in hindset than while they're happening.

Introducing LeaderMark

Last year, I set out to start my own consultancy called JeanaK Collabs. I'm excited to share with you that JeanaK Collabs is now LeaderMark! There are so many moments that led to this. Here are a few:

Learning the Game: In 2006, I was in a 1:1 with my manager at the time, where I was realizing that aspects of my identity were not serving me at work, and yet letting them go felt like compromising my cultural values or who I was. This felt similar to how I had to navigate the differences between my home culture and school culture as a kid, but with much more turmoil. My manager related and whatever she said planted a seed of curiosity around how work is supposed to be versus what really allows for everyone to thrive. It left in me a thought that lingered through my career to LeaderMark today: "Sometimes we play the Game to change the Game." LeaderMark is a new opportunity to advance work culture and make professional development more inclusive.
Building my own toolkit: Between 2016 and 2020, I went through major personal and professional changes and needed support that was difficult to find. I had to rely on my own resourcefulness to find breadcrumb after breadcrumb until, when the pandemic hit, I had developed my own toolkit which helped me navigate the quarantine alone. LeaderMark exists to make these tools and resources more accessible.
Time for creative play: In full-time work, my free time was spent recuperating from work. Now working for myself, my nervous system is way more at ease and I have the energy and time for creative play. Every week, I set aside time for this and I found myself "playing" in Google Slides, creating frameworks. And thus LeaderMark was born!
Accepting the dare: This year alone, more than half of my client-based interviews mentioned imposter syndrome. I've created programming to help thousands of others combat imposter syndrome and yet I couldn't spot it in myself. Recently, I've been afraid that everything with my business has just been luck and that luck would run out. It was a former-colleague-now-friend that spotted it for me: "That's imposter syndrome, Jeana." And that's when it all came together. During my creative play, the light bulb came on to share something in my toolbox with others also struggling with imposter syndrome: Remedy No. 1! This isn't a conventional workplace learning tool but LeaderMark is here to dare beyond the conventional so more people can access the confidence they need to succeed. And this is just the start!

I hope you'll check LeaderMark out and share it with others, and maybe, there's an opportunity for us to work together.