In this episode, I’m having a conversation with executive leadership coach, Jen Hope. She has a background in startup leadership and is passionate about sustained behavior change, mental health, and creating safe spaces for women. We discuss leadership styles, habits and systems and how self-kindness is the key to consistency.
Show Notes:
02:00 Going Way Back
Jen spent the first 20 years of her career working in the leading edge of marketing. When she moved to Seattle, she started working in growth marketing, building startup companies and scaling technology companies. From there, she became an executive coach.
04:07 Awareness in Leadership
She quickly realized that people in leadership roles in startup companies were not fully equipped for leadership. Jen invites us to consider what leadership actually means, and also have a sense of self awareness where you know your strengths and limitations.
08:27 Behavioral Preferences
With her clients, Jen starts with looking at behavior. There are a variety of ways to do leadership, but it’s important for people to know their unique and preferred style. Jen points people to DISK to understand the strengths and limitations of their preferred style.
13:01 We’re Our Own Worst Critic
There is a way to detach from our inner worst critic. Jen uses meditation to observe and label her thoughts. After taking a pause, she can then move forward in action. She shares some tools she uses for this process.
16:15 Self-Kindness
Jen has found that self-kindness is often an underutilized tool. High-achieving women feel that if they drive harder, they will achieve more success. When in reality, drive only gets us so far. Kindness and compassion are the remedy to allow ourselves to take a break or a step back.
19:55 Compassion and Consistency
If we want to get to behavior change, there are stages to it and there are different elements that we need along the way. Consistency and compassion allow us to move forward even if we took a pause. You can’t show up consistently in a judgemental headspace.
26:15 Habits
In my opinion, habits are so important to success. Jen is always tweaking her habits to improve and optimize on things that may work better. Jen shares some of the habits that are helpful in her daily life.
28:55 Health and Wellness
I see so many women being controlled by the number on the scale. Jen talks about her experience with intuitive eating. She had been going down a path where there was not enough flexibility. She adopted an additive approach instead of focusing on taking things out.
35:40 For the Woman Who Wants to Lead
Jen speaks to women who want to lead and make an impact, but may not feel qualified right now to do so. She looks to data as a tool to find information about ourselves objectively. Data is essential in business and can be used as facts to grow and improve. Jen shares ways to avoid emotion around data and metrics.
Resources from this episode:
Here’s Jen’s Website: heyjenhope.com
Here’s Jen’s Instagram: @heyjenhope
Learn About the 4 Week Gut Protocol: micahfolsomfit.com/gut
Here’s My Website: micahfolsomfit.com
Follow Me on Instagram: @micahfolsomfit
New Coach Mentorship: micahfolsomfit.com/coaching
